How to develop a taxi booking solution: Sharing tech and UI/UX design insights

If you want to start your own business but don't know which idea to pursue, you can try creating a taxi booking app. With the fast pace of life in cities and settlements, this will definitely be relevant — after all, who doesn't need to commute to work or travel to events in the evening? All you need is a small detail — to come up with an app with unique functionality that would capture the hearts of users.

In the article, we will talk about how to create a taxi booking app: how many applications will be needed, what technologies are required for app development, and how much such a project may cost.

How does a typical taxi booking app work?

Up-to-date taxi-hailing platforms usually work as follows: users sign into the app, input their current and destination address, the app finds the driver, then the passenger and the driver meet each other and start their trip.

The taxi apps can work by two key business models:

• The taxi service provider can hold the taxi fleet and employ drivers to execute the service for customers. In this case, the business holder wins from taxi booking app development since it helps automate internal processes and reduces the manual work of the employees.
• The business holder owns a taxi booking application that helps independent drivers find their customers, while the business owner makes money by charging commissions for using the app.

Cab booking apps, including Uber, usually utilize a two-faceted operating model for drivers and riders. This means that to get a fully functioning taxi service, you will need to develop at least three apps: a passenger app, a driver app, and an admin panel.

Taxi app market overview

Before diving head into taxi booking app development, let's take a look at market stats and understand if there will be any room for a new service in this competitive market. Here's the list of key stats:

• In 2022, the taxi app market has reached $201 billion and it is expected to keep growing until 2028.

• Uber, Lyft, Bolt, and inDrive can be considered the leaders of the taxi-hailing market since they made the biggest revenue recently.
• According to Statista research, local taxi services successfully adapted to the taxi-hailing model set by leading apps. Now apps like Uber face severe competition with regional services like Didi Chuxing in China, Grab in Southeast Asia, and Ola in India. These local providers adjusted their services to local preferences to win the hearts of their customers.

As you can see, the competition among taxi booking applications is tight but still, there is room for new apps as the market is growing worldwide.

Taxi booking apps to inspire with

With so many taxi app solutions available, you will need to withstand harsh competition. To win the hearts of the potential users you may consider targeting a specific group of people or solving a certain problem of the customers that other cab booking services don't solve. Below we'll enumerate several ideas you can use.

1. Taxi apps targeted at specific groups of people. When starting taxi app development, find out if your region has cab facilities for people with kids, pets, or wheelchair users. Although Uber already has all these offers at hand, these features might not be available in your local area.

One example of such tailored apps is Gett. Gett focuses on corporate transportation solutions, offering private rides for business travelers and executives. They provide a reliable and efficient service for companies looking for a streamlined transportation experience. This taxi service offers on-demand or pre-booked drives.

2. Carpooling app. Another idea for your taxi booking app development is a carpooling app. Carpooling apps connect users who travel in the same direction. These can be travelers, daily commuters, parents, or college students who study together.

One example of such an app is GoKid which is a carpooling app for school kids. Parents usually lack time to drive their kids to school themselves but are afraid to let their children go to school alone. GoKid solves this problem by giving kids to schools. More than that, parents can cooperate and gather classmates who live nearby into a single drive, so they can go to school together.

3. Cab booking for specific events. As a part of taxi booking app development, you can create an application for transfers to specific places or events like, sports competitions, festivals, hotel transfers, transfers to hiking trails, or airport transfers. Add a pre-booking feature to the service for higher convenience.

Features to implement during taxi booking app development

As we have already mentioned, if you decide to create your cab booking service, you will need to get the whole ecosystem of apps created for you. It will include a passenger app, a driver app, and an admin panel.

It's worth saying that to test your business idea on the taxi market, you can get something as simple as one screen with a button to call the taxi. That's exactly what Uber did when it first launched on the market.

However, if your market already has rivals and competitors, you will need to think about something more detailed, and feature-rich. We have made a list of features that modern users expect to see in a taxi booking application.

Passenger app

• Registration and profile — allow passengers to create an account and set up their profiles with personal information, addresses, and payment details for seamless booking.
• Ride booking — provide passengers of your taxi booking app with the ability to book a ride by inputting their pick-up and drop-off locations, selecting a vehicle type, and choosing a preferred payment method.
• Live cab tracking — provide real-time tracking of the assigned driver's location and the estimated time of arrival at the pick-up point.
• Fee estimation — let users find out their transfer fee before the ride. Form it based on distance, time, and selected vehicle type.
• Driver details — display information about the assigned driver, including name, photo, vehicle details, and driver rating.
• In-app chat — provide users of your cab booking app with features to contact the driver for coordination and inquiries.
• Multiple payment options — in the process of taxi booking app development offer various payment methods, such as credit/debit cards, mobile wallets, and cash, to cater to different user preferences.
• Ride history — maintain a record of past rides, including trip details, payment history, and receipts for easy reference.
• Rating and feedback — during the process of app development, enable passengers to rate their ride experience and provide feedback on the driver and service for quality control and improvement purposes.

Driver app

• Driver registration and profile — enable drivers to create an account, submit required documents like license, insurance, and vehicle registration for verification, and set up their profiles with personal information.
• Accept or reject ride requests — let drivers accept ride offers based on their availability and proximity to the pick-up location.
• Navigation and route optimization — consider installing GPS-powered features into your taxi booking app to help drivers navigate to the pick-up and drop-off locations efficiently.
• Driver availability settings — while creating your custom taxi booking app allow drivers to set their availability status to indicate when they are online and ready to accept ride requests, as well as the option to schedule breaks or log out when needed.
• Income and commission tracker — in the process of mobile app development, install features for tracking earnings, so drivers always know how much they already earned and how much they need to give to the service provider.
• Driver ratings and feedback — in the process of taxi app development, don't forget to allow drivers to view passenger ratings and feedback to improve their service quality and maintain a good reputation.
• Trip history — just like passengers, drivers may want to keep track of their past rides. Provide them with data including start/end locations, durations, fares, and passenger ratings.
• Messaging system — drivers need this feature to chat with their passengers.
• Cashless payment system — enable drivers to receive payments electronically through the app, ensuring secure and convenient transactions without the need for cash exchanges.

Admin panel

• Dashboard — a centralized dashboard for admins to monitor key metrics, such as active drivers, ongoing rides, revenue generated, and user feedback.
• User management — the taxi booking application manager should be able to manage user accounts, including drivers and passengers, by reviewing registrations, resolving disputes, and handling account-related issues.
• Driver management — allow admins to onboard new drivers, verify documents, manage driver profiles, and address driver-related concerns or complaints.
• Ride monitoring — features for real-time tracking of rides, including viewing active rides, identifying ride statuses, tracking driver locations, and ensuring smooth ride operations.
• Financial management — managing payment transactions, processing payouts to drivers, handling refunds, and ensuring secure payment processing within the app.
• Fare management — setting and adjusting fare rates, discounts, surcharges, and promotional offers to attract users and maintain competitiveness in the market.
• Customer support — provide your taxi app solution with a support management system to address user queries, complaints, and feedback, ensuring timely resolution of issues and maintaining a high level of customer satisfaction.

Design principles follow during taxi booking app development

In regions where smaller apps have to compete with large rivals such as Uber, users tend to choose apps that are better designed. During taxi app development, you can follow our UI/UX tips to provide your customer with a cutting-edge user experience.

Tip 1: Make the interface aesthetically pleasing

Passengers tend to perceive attractive interfaces as user-friendly ones. An interface created with a limited and consistent color palette, understandable icons, and high-quality images is more likely to feel easy and pleasant to use. Therefore, amid harsh taxi market competition, an attractive interface is not just about looks but about fostering a delightful user experience.

Tip 2: Focus on responsiveness

Google researches prove that users tend to leave the mobile application if it fails to load within 3 seconds. That's why it's ultimately important to make your app feel quick and responsive. You can achieve this by incorporating progress bars, animations, and other feedback mechanisms that match the user's actions to enhance the interaction, making the app feel more responsive and alive.

Tip 3: Design with accessibility in mind

Remember that the taxi app is used by a wide variety of users, and some of them use it in the night, rain, and other conditions with poor visibility. That's why place key buttons and features within easy reach. This design principle, drawn from Fitts's Law, suggests that users are more likely to engage with an app when essential functions are conveniently accessible, thus improving user satisfaction and potentially driving revenue.

Tip 4: Limit information load

During taxi app development take into account that users can book cabs on the daily run when they have much to do. You may encourage your users to make purchasing decisions faster by offering a limited number of choices.

According to Hick's Law, the time it takes to make a decision increases with the number and complexity of choices. Streamlining options, whether it's the type of rides available or payment methods, can enhance the user experience and make the decision-making process quicker and less overwhelming.

Tip 5: Simplify the user interface

The principle of simplicity cannot be overstated in app design. A taxi booking app should feature an intuitive, easy-to-navigate interface, enabling users to book rides effortlessly. Clean designs with conspicuous call-to-action buttons improve overall user satisfaction by making navigation seamless and straightforward.

Our team has already participated in several taxi app development projects. We have gained experience that helps us to design similar interfaces with all the mentioned design principles in mind.

Ronas IT experience in taxi app solution redesign

Our team strives to keep up with the latest changes in different industries. For instance, when Uber released an application for delivering food and groceries, we held a UI/UX design workshop where we redesigned this app a bit and offered a few features that we thought would make the in-app experience smoother and more enjoyable. Here's how we would enhance this taxi booking application.

Onboarding. Quite often delivery and taxi booking apps miss this important step, even though it introduces users to the key features and establishes trust and credibility. By guiding users step-by-step through the app's features, onboarding ensures that they understand how to navigate and utilize the app efficiently. This empowers users to confidently place orders, track deliveries, and explore additional services without any frustration or confusion.

Bill-splitting feature. Before diving into implementing key features we ran a short survey among Ronas IT's employees who fit the target audience of Uber's cab booking app. In Google Forms, they explained what they like and dislike about current food delivery services, taxi apps, and parcel deliveries. It turned out that one of the inconveniences they always meet is bill-splitting. Many answered that it's always a headache to do that manually. That's why one of the features that we offered to implement in the Uber taxi booking solution was bill-splitting.

Parcel delivery feature and an AI integration. We offered to add functionality for parcel delivery. Uber services partner with courier services for food delivery, that's why we offered to add courier delivery for personal packages. The principles behind ordering package delivery are similar to those of taxi booking. Users can select both the pickup and delivery locations for their items. They can easily track the progress of the delivery and know the estimated arrival time. And, if needed, they can communicate directly with the courier.

Instagram-like stories. Nothing inspires users to buy and order more than colorful photos of food. That's why we offered to add stories with photos of dishes and recipes for them. The recipes are complemented with lists of products that can be used to cook them. We think this feature could inspire users to order more from Uber's super taxi app.

Menu revamp. Also, we believe that intuitive icons are worth adding to app design. You don't have a chance to mistake a bicycle for a scooter or parcel delivery for food delivery if you see the photo-like buttons in the menu. Therefore, in the process of taxi app development, we enhanced the menu with realistic visuals.

Subscription screen. The last thing we thought would enhance Uber's cab booking app was a subscription. Although we didn't invent the Uber Pass itself, we edited its screen and added the delivery feature that our team implemented during the workshop.

Results. It took our UI/UX design team 8 hours to create the concept of the interface with new features. And our efforts were not wasted! Design Rush gave us an award for creating the best concept for the Uber Super app. You can find out more about the workshop and its results in our Behance profile and a detailed article about our experience.

Technologies to use for taxi app development

When it comes to the technical implementation of the taxi app, the process can be divided into several steps. Let's discuss them below.

Choosing tech stack. This type of app consists of many parts and services, which is why taxi app developers need to have wide expertise in working with an up-to-date tech stack. To understand what the tech stack the developers may need to work with, let's take a look at Uber technologies.

As you can see, if you decide to launch on the taxi app market, you will have to build an ecosystem of several apps: a web admin panel, native mobile apps for iOS and Android, or a cross-platform app that can be launched in both operating systems.

Building a two-faceted model with native languages requires separate technologies and a profound knowledge of JavaScript, Objective-C, and Swift. However, it is possible to build it with React Native as well. To do so, the following stack of technologies is needed: Navigation for creating easy-to-use interfaces and routes of the app, Redux for state management, Tailwind and CSS for styling and layout, and Google Autocomplete for location search and suggestions.

The tech stack used during taxi app development depends on your business goals: whether you want to start with cross-platform development right from the start or concentrate on one platform and scale the service later; whether you want to hire a team of dedicated developers for native app development with different languages or planning to partner with a single React Native developer building the whole product with JavaScript technologies.

Coding. When the tech stack and approach are chosen and the UI/UX design mockup is completed, it's time to start coding. In this process, developers write the code and push it to the development IT environment.

We highly recommend dividing the process of coding just as the entire mobile app development process into 2–3 week sprints. Thus the developers can complete the work piece by piece, present the results to the customer, keep them informed and quickly adjust to the requirements of the customer change.

Testing. The app development process isn't complete when the code is created. At this stage, the created app needs to be tested. At this stage, our apps are tested manually by the developers or with the help of automated tools. At Ronas IT, we usually implement tools like Sentry and Datadog to find bugs and track other mistakes. We also use tools for monitoring the app loading speed, since this is one of the most important metrics of commercial apps in the modern world.

Release. At the app development stage, the process of releasing a mobile app involves launching the finalized version to app stores such as the Apple App Store and Google Play Store. This release involves submitting the app for review, ensuring compliance with store guidelines, and making it available for users to download and install on their devices.

During many years on the market, we have released more than 15 apps, that's why we already know all app store requirements and are able to help our customers with the release.

In web development, the release process typically involves pushing the completed application to the production environment. This step ensures that the latest version of the web app is accessible to users on the live site, following thorough testing and quality checks to prevent any issues during release.

Our team has a separate service where we deploy several IT environments for development and release. We keep maintaining them throughout the entire development cycle and lifetime of the mobile application.

Post-release maintenance. Post-release maintenance in app development involves ongoing support, updates, and bug fixes after the initial release of the app. This includes monitoring app performance, addressing user feedback, implementing new features, and ensuring compatibility with the latest operating systems. Post-release maintenance is essential for app longevity, user satisfaction, and continued success in the competitive app market. Our team supports the apps by subscription.

How much does taxi booking app development cost?

The app development cost depends on many factors including the app's complexity and its method of development. You can develop your app either with an in-house team, choose a solution offered by a freelancer, or find an outsourcing team. With any method of hiring, the price will depend on the region where your IT providers are located, and the technologies they are going to work with.

To clarify the issue of app development cost a bit, let's observe the statistics provided by Clutch. According to it, the typical cost for mobile app development projects varies between $10,000–$49,999. This estimate seems quite realistic for us since we would estimate developing a two-faceted mobile app with basic features and an admin panel as $50,000.

Another survey run by Goodfirms says a full analog of Uber would cost $152,776 and take 13 months to develop. Luckily, at the beginning, the business doesn't need a full analog to start a successful business, as only MVP with key features and minimal design is enough.

At Ronas IT, we usually make estimates for projects, and we have already estimated several projects in the cab field as a taxi app development company. Depending on the complexity of the app and the number of its details, its development can cost $96,090–$240,885 and 9–18 months. The taxi booking app development takes that much because it has many features and needs several apps to function.

To sum up

Building a taxi booking app can be a challenging but rewarding process. To differentiate it from the leader of the market like Uber, you may consider creating a taxi service to solve specific problems of your customers like making transfers to airports and business events.

Ultimately, developing a new taxi booking application requires detailed planning, implementation, and continuous improvements to ensure its success. In this case, knowing the user flow of the app, including the steps involved in requesting a ride and paying, is crucial for providing a seamless experience. Should you find this path too challenging, the Ronas IT team is ready to ride you to the final destination and build your MVP.