Comprehensive Guide to Pregnancy Tracker App Development

What could be better than making a successful product that also helps people during a wonderful time in their lives? We’re talking, of course, about pregnancy tracking app development. Such solutions help mothers-to-be keep tabs on their pregnancy. After all, 65% of modern moms rely on the internet for information, so why not provide it via an app?

The convenience of a mobile solution that tracks pregnancy and associated symptoms and information cannot be overstated. It helps moms take their minds off the medical aspects of it and focus on their upcoming baby and the joy that comes with it. It also simplifies doctors’ lives by providing a tool for quick learning and consultations, giving moms peace of mind, too.

So, how does one make such a handy instrument and do it right? Today’s guide will teach you all there is to know about pregnancy app development and its components. We’ll take you through must-have features, discuss development steps, and break down the cost of all that work. In the end, you’ll have a full understanding of this niche and a trusty companion to help you enter it.

Market Overview for Pregnancy Tracking Apps

Research shows that up to 72% of people are willing to rely on apps to survey their health and ensure a steady pregnancy. It has helped the market boom with a 217 million cap in 2022, a 4x increase in just 2 years. As a result, pregnancy app development is not only a good deed but a good investment.

Despite that, it’s important to remember this is a competitive niche. We’ll talk about the top apps below. Now, suffice it to say the market is quite saturated. This makes it harder to break through unless you’re offering something truly unique. That is why research is vital, helping find ways to engage users and address their needs.

Key Features of Leading Pregnancy Tracking Apps

To assist you with pregnancy tracking app development, we looked at the market’s leading players. This not only allowed us to see what users want, but assess what success means in this niche, as well as what propels an app toward it.

What to Expect in Top Pregnancy Apps

A few core elements are common among the top apps we’ll list. You’ll notice that many of these are specifically directed at making the apps accessible and pleasant to use. That includes:

• Simple design;
• Community-building features;
• Curated content.

All three make the app feel like a straightforward space to learn more about the pregnancy and find others in the same condition. This incentivizes regular use and gives the app some baseline value, even before we get into features. So clearly, a vital part of pregnancy app development is building a “hook” for the audience.

Noteworthy Apps in the Market

Now, it’s time to discuss which apps have captured the market’s attention and their success.

Ovia

First up on the list is Ovia, a market mainstay that has amassed millions of users and is one of the best-known pregnancy apps out there. Its powerful tracking and rich knowledge base make it a vital tool for many moms around the world. Not to mention its thriving community, which runs a comfortable space for mothers-to-be.

What to Expect

Part of a huge brand launched by the book “What to Expect When You’re Expecting,” this veteran app is consistently at the top of App Store charts for medical solutions. It offers a steady stream of pregnancy-related content and a huge community. As a result, users always have some reason to come back, not just to track their pregnancy but to help others.

Understanding User Preferences

So, how did these apps go from pregnancy app development to such widespread popularity? The key is catering to users and meeting their demands while also giving them solutions to problems they didn’t even know about. In practice, this means refining your UI/UX design to be comfortable for everyone, even those using an app for the first time.

It’s also important not to overload the app with unnecessary functions, menus, and comprehensive knowledge bases. Instead, offer the essentials, trim navigation to be faster, and ensure your information is presented simply and concisely. Moms should be able to understand it without the need to use Google or call their doctor.

Essential Components of a Successful Pregnancy Tracking App

We’ve already talked a bit about building a pregnancy app, but it’s also important to lay the baseline of features. Here are the ones that we’d consider foundational and those delivering the most value.

User Experience and Interface Design

A strong focus on UX and UI during pregnancy app development ensures that you’re presenting a visually appealing app that can attract users just on the strength of design alone. That’s a powerful approach, as it engages casual users and helps your app stand out among the rest. Make sure that all vital functions are close by with minimal taps required to do anything useful.

Core Tracking Features

The app must be able to act as a one-stop center for all baby-related information:

• Developmental milestones;
• Due date approximation;
• Mom’s weight;
• Belly size;
• Doctor’s appointments and notes.

By tracking all of this, you ensure that no other apps are required and that moms get a handy tool to track their pregnancy. Even small things like journaling and photo albums can be helpful and create meaning for a mom using your app.

Personalized Content & Notifications

Pregnancy is an emotional time. So, it’s important to feel some support from the app, even when it’s just in the form of personal consultations and media. Check-ins through notifications encouraging the user and reminding them to take vitamins and measurements are also quite helpful. In the end, it’s all about making your users feel welcome and providing valuable content.

Leveraging Advanced Technologies

The advance of AI and machine learning can be a huge benefit for pregnancy tracking app development. It allows for better personalization, the ability to create “live assistants”, and analyze medical data more precisely. So remember to use everything at your disposal, consult your team on what technologies may work best.

Step-by-Step Guide to Developing a Pregnancy Tracker App

Now the feature suggestions are done and we’ve looked at successful apps. Let’s learn exactly how you can develop a pregnancy app. We’ll take pregnancy tracking mobile app development in steps.

Defining Purpose and Core Features

Document your product’s goal and ways to achieve it, outlining features that will bring the most value and have a reasonable final cost. Here, you need to compare your app to competitors and estimate if your current plan is good enough to outpace them.

Research, Compliance, and Security Considerations

Since pregnancy tracking mobile app development falls in the healthcare category, it’s important to do your research on compliance and doctors’ advice. Your app must offer practical medical information vetted by professionals. Plus, medical data is extremely sensitive, so lay out your plans for the app’s security early on and make sure they’re multi-layered.

UI/UX Design and Prototyping

As we’ve stressed already, design is vital. So, make sure to iterate a bunch and create a responsive, beautiful app. Testing with actual users by offering them prototypes is essential, as it lets you get real feedback based on how real moms will use the app.

Development and Integration of Key Functionalities

The actual process of pregnancy tracking app development will involve your team or your outsource partner creating the app with all the features you desire. Management is important here, guaranteeing that the process moves smoothly and within the preset timeline.

Testing, Launch, and Continuous Improvement

Your last step is extensive QA, polishing the app to perfection. Once ready, deploy it to app stores with a launch marketing campaign and collect usage data. With analytics helping steer further development and updates, you can set a long-term plan for the app.

Pregnancy App Development Strategies for Success

In addition to knowing which steps to take during pregnancy tracking mobile app development, it’s good to have a sense of which approach works best. Here are a couple of tips on what strategies you can adopt for your product.

All-in-One vs. Specialized Feature Approach

It’s important to assess whether you want to have a sort of “multi-tool” app or one that offers one major killer feature. While it’s great to provide the baseline functionality, you need to see what the market wants above that.

For example, AI-powered features may help you gain popularity, but it might be more cost-effective to create features that target a specific niche. Moms pregnant with twins, possible preemie babies, and other situations could really use your app’s help, which is where features come into play.

Choosing Between In-App Features and Integrations

It’s also important to decide which data you want to work with yourself and which can be handled by integrated APIs. Partnering up with a medical institution is financially prudent but it’s important not to put too much functionality outside the app’s own domain. Otherwise, you run the risk of making users wonder why they even need the app when they can go to the source.

Ensuring Privacy and Data Security in Pregnancy Apps

We’ve mentioned how crucial security and privacy are in pregnancy tracking app development. However, this is a topic that deserves a closer look. Even if we don’t take into account medical data regulations like HIPAA, user privacy is vital, and it’s your job to protect it.

While many pregnancy apps collect and process data, they are transparent about how they do it and which types of data are used. You need to have the same approach while also offering data encryption and authentication tools that prevent unauthorized entry to a user’s account.

Cost Breakdown for Developing a Pregnancy Tracker App

Another thing to consider for pregnancy tracking app development is how much money you want to invest versus how much it may actually cost. You need to calculate which features justify the expense and what kind of team you can assemble.

Outsourcing can obviously help save a bit of your budget. In that case, make sure you pick a seasoned team like JetBase to guarantee top-notch quality. Thanks to our decade in the market and broad portfolio, we know how to make an app that delivers value without costing too much. Here are the approximate numbers we’ve seen in practice for pregnancy apps.

Best Practices and Challenges in Pregnancy App Development

When making a product, it’s easy to let your ambitions cloud your judgment and try to do too much. Restraint and taking the right approach help ensure that your app will be successful and offer real value. Here is JetBase’s advice on that.

IoT and Wearable Integrations

Connecting smartwatches and medical wearables to your app allows you to track pregnancies more precisely, with specific health data. Ensure that your app has gateways to support instant data sync and secure storage, guaranteeing that the data is error-free and timely.

Multiplatform Availability (iOS, Android)

Capturing a big market sector with pregnancy tracking app development is only possible if you’re covering the major platforms. So craft native versions for both iOS and Android and make sure that the app runs smoothly, even on older devices and OS versions.

Enhancing User Engagement

Gamifying pregnancy may seem unusual, but offering moms milestone trophies, quizzes on baby health, and a competitive social element will help keep them interested. You don’t need to make them mandatory, of course, but a feature that entertains while offering insight can be quite valuable.

Collecting and Utilizing User Feedback

Everybody has their own preferences, and it’s important to make their voices heard, even if it’s in little details. Leave feedback forms so that your users can suggest features, offer insights, and report potential issues. This way you make sure the app is comfortable and have a direct line to the people who make your app successful.

Integration with Telehealth Services

Being able to quickly reach out to their doctor helps moms stay stress-free and address emergencies through your app. By adding telemedicine capabilities, you build a bridge between the user and medical professionals, which also helps establish your app as reputable.

Ensuring Accessibility and Inclusivity

Consider everyone when you’re deep in pregnancy tracking app development, as not all moms will have the same technical proficiency or even physical faculties. Create special functions for users with vision and hearing impairments, offer specialized fonts, and try to create a uniform experience. Moms-to-be mustn’t feel left out for any reason, and your app should welcome them.

Building Community and User Support Networks

As we’ve already pointed out, successful pregnancy apps all feature thriving communities that engage users and connect them. Make sure you have social features enabled in your app to create that same kind of ecosystem, with forums, personal pages, and chatting.

Create Your Own Pregnancy Tracker App with JetBase

Before we finish our guide to pregnancy tracking app development, we have to mention the obvious. Making such products is easier when you have a reliable partner, a company that has years of experience and knows the medical field. Luckily, you’re already familiar with one such team — JetBase.

With more than a decade of experience and multiple successful healthcare solutions, we are veterans of the market. Thanks to excellent communication skills and deep market insight, JetBase will help you make an app that succeeds for years to come, even on a tight budget.

If you want your pregnancy app to deliver results, let’s schedule a consultation today.