Instagram has become the need of the hour, and it is a cross-platform app developed on the React Native platform. From being a social media platform that initially allowed its users to socialize with their friends to being a vast platform for business, Instagram has come a long way. With the aid of this article, you will learn about Instagram's history, how to develop a similar app and how it is helpful in business.

History

Well, in its initial form, Instagram was comprehended as Burbn. Kevin Systrom is the face behind this, who was a mere working professional and used to learn coding at night. After brainstorming for several years, he built an HTML5 prototype named Burbn.

The following essential step was to give it to his friends and family. This is one of the fundamental business etiquettes where you test your creation with the help of friends and family.

After this, he met several investors at parties and was lucky enough to bag an investment worth $500,000 and quit his job. And then, he returned to the older version (Burbn), prototyped a photo sharing app from scratch, and decided to take pictures as the focal point. After this, he realized that he already had an app that had everything, from check-ins to photos.

It led to his meeting with Mike, popularly known as the co-founder of Burbn, and tried to turn it into an iPhone App. But this idea became clustered and resulted in throwing out every other feature except photographs, which led to the renaming of Burbn to Instagram. It became the top-rated photo app and is still sitting on that throne.

Why did Mark Zuckerberg Invest in Instagram?

Mark Zuckerberg came into the scene in 2012 when he bought Instagram for $1 Billion. And this was shocking as the company was working with 13 employees at that time. And now IG's worth is over $100 billion, and it also adds up to $20 billion to Meta's annual revenue.

The technological aspect behind this has a different story. Meta and Instagram are connected, and Meta manages the user data to provide a robust advertising platform. The primary target is younger generation, with 59% more active on Instagram than Meta. In contrast, people of older age groups are more active on Meta.

Business on Instagram

We found out that Instagram has become one of the best marketplaces and this data. Adding to this, more than 200 Million business accounts are registered on Instagram.

And almost 130 million users click on that "Shopping" Tab, making the business sector of IG more successful.

Now, there are two types of businesses that we get to see on Instagram:

1. A company built on Instagram: These small businesses have developed and organically grown and brought in customers.
2. Business advertising on Instagram: These are big businesses or already established ones using the IG ads as their medium to promote their business, build a strong PR, and convert the leads into customers. Many social media marketing agencies in the USA have mastered this algorithm of IG Ads and are helping their clients with social media marketing. We at Prime are also well equipped with this facility of providing social media marketing to our clients and helping them prosper in the best way possible.

If you want to make an app with high efficiency and is easy to maintain, we can’t make it cross-platform. This is why a few app developers wish to develop such applications on native platforms, which are more stable than the cross-platform app.

Instagram broke all the barriers as a powerful social media platform that helps you grow.

And the whole internet is now spammed with the monetization of Instagram reels, making it worth it for the influencers to earn more money. Influencers on Instagram have emerged since the pandemic happened and are now a massive industry in itself. Many small and even big businesses are approaching IG influencers to promote their product on the page.

And in this process, reels have been the best option to reach as many people as possible. The monetization would help these influencers to earn a minimum of $100 at 50k views. We also hear that the algorithm would become stricter than the prevailing one.

Difference between Instagram Clone and an App like Instagram

At first, we need to find a thin line between an app like Instagram and an Instagram clone.

An app like Instagram is similar to it with similar features but not wholly the same. There can be other features as well. But an Instagram clone is different, and it is the exact copy of Instagram with the same features and different names. #1 App company is Meta, followed by Messenger, Whatsapp, and Instagram.

There has been fuss all around in recent times regarding the clones of these apps, and the only reason behind this is the revenue these apps are generating.

Difference between Instagram Clone and an App like Instagram

At first, we need to find a thin line between an app like Instagram and an Instagram clone.

An app like Instagram is similar to it with similar features but not wholly the same. There can be other features as well. But an Instagram clone is different, and it is the exact copy of Instagram with the same features and different names. #1 App company is Meta, followed by Messenger, Whatsapp, and Instagram.

There has been fuss all around in recent times regarding the clones of these apps, and the only reason behind this is the revenue these apps are generating.

What is the Time of Developing an App like Instagram, and how much does it Cost to Make a Powerful Social Media Platform?

Prime Group of Companies LLC is known as the best app development agency in the USA. In our opinion, the secret of its success lies in the set of exciting features, the simplicity of the interface, and excellent app performance. But let's not go into too much detail or consider having one by one.

To start a development process, you should be clear about the options your app will include. The User experience with your application begins with account authorization. Consider providing the opportunity to register with an email account, phone number, or a social media page. The total time for implementing this option is about 67 hours, both for backend and mobile development. Once users have logged in, they should edit the account. Primary changeable fields include name, gender, phone number, website, etc.

For this, add 48 hours to the total build time. Let your customers communicate with you using a message exchange option. Set it up so that they can chat in real-time. It increases the development time further to 132 hours.

Settings should be adjustable for convenience of usage. Let your customers choose the interface language, enable/disable push notification, set the account as private, etc. Depending on the number and complexity of settings, consider adding 96 to 128 hours.

Uploading photos and videos is an essential Instagram App. Do not forget such details as preview display, uploading existing content, commenting, tagging, taking pics, etc. This functionality might take from 76 up to 320 development hours.

Instagram is known for its filters. Amaro, Brannan, Hudson, Slumber, Cream- to list just a few of them. Users like to play photos by changing how they look, and that's why picture customization is a must-have for your App.

Note that applying standard filters doesn't take much time-36 hours in total. However, to create custom filters, you should add 16 hours for each one. Don't forget about rotating, straightening, and setting up perspectives.

All in all, time for adding photo customization will take 68 hours. What is good about Instagram is that you can interact with friends, other than which social network they prefer. The more social media you can integrate into your App, the better. However, consider adding 8 hours for implementing each of them.

The integration of geolocation help to extend the functionality of your application and make it more interesting. Users like sharing places where photos and videos are taken. To include this option, add another 24 hours total time of development.

Last but not least is the addition of a search option. Allow users to look for information using a set of predefined parameters—for example, filter by light post or tagged photos. Be ready to spend 64 hours on this. I have reviewed all the basic options to be included in an app similar to Instagram. However, the cost does not end here.

As well as being functionality-rich, your App should have good-looking and user-friendly. To achieve that, add 60 hours for or for the UI design. An app based on photo and video sharing won't survive without a reliable dedicated service. The hosting price may greatly vary depending on the disk speed, data traffic, storage type, operating hours, physical server location, etc.

Start with free hosting, then move on to the more powerful but more expensive storage services. Development team location may significantly affect your App costs. To save money, we advise you to hire an experienced app development agency based in the USA who understands your needs and has tremendous experience in this field. Ukrainian coders are likely to charge you about $50 per hour.

We recommend creating a native application since this is a sure way to provide the best user experience. In this view, consider multiplying the development time depending on the number of operating systems you want to cover. As a minimum, you should double the cost to create both IOS and Android platforms. We have read that stage where a bottom line price can be calculated. The formula is relatively simple. We will multiply the total time required by the hourly rate of the development team, which is a final sum of $67,000 approximately.