Make an iPhone App for Free: What It Really Costs

Making an app for free works up to a specific point: building and testing cost nothing, publishing costs money. Apple charges $99 a year, Google $25 one time. In between, it all depends on the tool: most "free" plans let you build the app, then charge you the day you want to put it live.

This guide sorts it out, one approach at a time: no-code tools, AI, Android, then the path I use for my own iPhone apps. Every price comes from the official pages. The no-code and AI prices were checked on October 2, 2026.

Making an app for free: the short answer

Approach	What's free	What you pay for
A no-code tool	Building and testing in the editor	Publishing: $25 to $59 a month depending on the tool
AI that writes the code	A few requests per day	Daily use: from $20 a month
Code, with Expo, Xcode or Android Studio	Everything you need to build the app	Nothing before publishing
Publishing on the stores	Nothing	$99 a year at Apple, $25 one time at Google

No-code tools: what their free plan lets you do

Almost every no-code app builder has a free plan. It's for building and trying things out. Of the five I checked, none publishes to the stores for free.

Tool	Free	Locked	To publish
Adalo	Build and test, 500 records per app	Publishing to the web, the App Store and Google Play	Starter, $36 a month billed annually
Glide	10 projects, limited credits	Publishing apps	Basic, $25 a month
Bubble	The development version and on-device testing	The live site and submission to the stores	Starter, $59 a month billed annually
FlutterFlow	Build and test, 2 projects	Code download and deployment to the stores	Basic, $39 a month
Thunkable	3 public projects, 5 screens per project	Private projects and publishing	Builder, $37 a month billed annually

Two things to note. Publishing with these tools doesn't remove Apple's and Google's fees: they come on top of the subscription. And not all of them produce a store app: Glide says its apps are web apps and that publishing directly to the App Store or Google Play isn't supported.

"Free" app generators: what they limit

Lots of tools promise to make an app for free. Their free plan is real, but it almost always blocks one of these three things:

• Branding: your app shows the tool's logo or name, which looks bad on an app you want to sell.
• Code export: you can't get your project out, so you stay dependent on the platform and its future pricing.
• Publishing: submitting to the App Store is reserved for paid plans, or impossible if the tool only produces a web app.

And even when the tool does publish, the Apple membership is still on you. On its pricing page, look for these three words: branding, export, publishing.

Making an app for free with AI

AI writes the code for you, and that code is yours. There's a free plan, but it's counted in requests per day:

• Cursor has a free plan with a limited number of agent requests.
• Lovable gives 5 credits a day, 30 a month at most, and builds web apps.
• Bolt gives 300,000 tokens a day and 1 million a month, with its logo on the site it produces.
• Claude Code isn't in Claude's free plan: it's included in the paid plans, starting at $20 a month.

That's enough to try it out and generate a few screens. Not enough to build an entire app: once you work every day, you hit the quotas fast. The method, its limits and its risks are in "Vibe coding: what is it". And for the full method on this path, there's the vibe coding course page.

Making an Android app for free

On Android, the free path goes further than on iPhone. Android Studio, Google's official tool, downloads directly. To install your app on your own phone, the Android documentation doesn't require any paid account: you just turn on developer options and USB debugging.

Publishing, on the other hand, costs $25 one time to open a Google Play account. And a personal account created after November 13, 2023 must first pass a closed test with at least 12 testers for 14 days in a row. That's not a fee, it's a delay to plan for.

With React Native and Expo, the same project gives you the Android app and the iPhone app. The rest of this guide covers the Apple side, the one I work on.

Can you make an iPhone app for free?

Yes, mostly. You can code, test on your iPhone and get your app compiled without paying a cent, thanks to Xcode, Expo and the free plans of EAS, Supabase and RevenueCat. However, publishing on the App Store or using TestFlight requires the Apple Developer Program, at $99 a year.

Building and testing: free, with limits. Publishing: paid, except in very specific cases. This guide shows you where the line is, so you don't pay too early or discover blocking fees the night before launch.

I publish my own iOS apps with React Native, Expo, EAS, RevenueCat and Supabase. Solys, an alarm clock with mini-games, and TradaZen, a trading practice app, are on the App Store. All the numbers below come from each tool's official pages, checked on September 23, 2026.

What's really free, and what isn't

Here's the table I wish I'd had at the start, for the stack I use.

Item	Free?	Real cost	When you pay
Xcode	Yes	0 euros, but you need a Mac	Never for the tool itself
Testing on your iPhone with a free Apple Account	Yes	0 euros, profile valid 7 days, 3 devices	When you want TestFlight or to stop reinstalling every week
Expo and React Native	Yes	0 euros, open source	Never for the framework
Expo Go (App Store)	Yes	0 euros, version tied to an older SDK	For the latest version on iPhone, through your Apple membership
EAS Build (Free plan)	Yes, with a quota	15 iOS and 15 Android builds a month	Beyond that: Starter plan at $19 a month, or wait for next month
Supabase (Free plan)	Yes, with a quota	2 active projects, 500 MB database, 50,000 monthly active users	Pro plan from $25 a month
RevenueCat	Yes, up to a threshold	0 euros up to $2,500 of tracked revenue a month	1% of tracked revenue beyond that
AI tools	Limited free plans	Low quotas	As soon as you code every day
Apple Developer Program	No, unless waived	$99 a year, shown in local currency	For TestFlight, App Store Connect and publishing
Apple's commission	No	15% with the Small Business Program	On every sale, taken by Apple

The takeaway is simple: everything you need to build the app is free at the start. What you need to distribute it goes through Apple, and Apple charges.

The free tools, one by one

Xcode and testing on your own iPhone

Xcode, Apple's development tool, is free on the Mac App Store. Its listing says you need a recent Mac: the current version requires macOS 26.6 and a Mac with an Apple M1 chip or later.

With a plain Apple Account, no paid membership, you can install your app on your iPhone from Xcode. The official membership comparison sets the limits of this free personal team:

• provisioning profiles expire 7 days after they're created, then you have to rebuild and reinstall;
• you can register up to 3 devices;
• you can install up to 3 apps per device.

That's enough to build your first version, not to have someone else test it.

Expo Go: free, with a catch in 2026

Expo Go is an app that loads your project on your phone when you scan a QR code. It's free on the App Store. The catch is the version: according to Expo's May 2026 changelog, the App Store version stays on SDK 54. To run a newer version of Expo Go on a physical iPhone, the Expo documentation says you need an active Apple Developer Program membership, because you build your own copy with eas go and install it through TestFlight.

Two paths stay free. Since SDK 56, create-expo-app offers to create a project compatible with the App Store's Expo Go. And on a Mac, Expo Go installs for free in the iOS simulator, whatever the SDK version.

Another limit: Expo Go only contains Expo's native modules. If you use a native library that isn't included, like the RevenueCat SDK, you need a development build.

EAS Build: 15 iOS builds a month

EAS Build compiles your app in the cloud, so you don't have to handle everything in Xcode. According to Expo's pricing page, the Free plan includes 15 iOS builds and 15 Android builds, in a low-priority queue, with a 45-minute limit per build. EAS Submit, which sends your app to the stores, is included too.

Two details that matter. First, the billing FAQ explains that once your quota runs out, you can't start a build until the first day of the next month, unless you build locally or switch to a paid plan. Second, free EAS Build doesn't spare you the Apple account: simulator builds don't need one, but installing a build on registered iPhones requires a paid Apple Developer account, just like builds meant for the App Store.

Supabase and RevenueCat: free while your app is small

For data and user accounts, Supabase's Free plan includes 2 active projects, a 500 MB database, 50,000 monthly active users, 1 GB of file storage and 5 GB of egress bandwidth. The trap: a free project is paused after a week of inactivity. For an app in production, that's a real risk. The Pro plan starts at $25 a month.

For subscriptions, RevenueCat is free up to $2,500 of tracked revenue a month, then charges 1% of what you track beyond that. In other words, you only pay RevenueCat once your app is already making money. It's the most honest model on the list.

AI tools: limited free plans

Claude, ChatGPT and Cursor have a free plan. It's enough to generate a few screens, not to code a whole app day after day: you hit the quotas fast. These plans change often, so check them on each vendor's page. To figure out whether AI or no-code fits your project, I compared the two paths in make an app without coding.

What you pay for: publishing on the App Store

This is where "free" stops for almost everyone. The Apple Developer Program costs 99 USD per membership year, and Apple notes that the price is shown in your local currency during enrollment. Without this membership, no App Store Connect, no TestFlight, no publishing.

I covered enrollment, choosing between individual and organization (with its D-U-N-S number) and the right time to pay in Apple developer account: price and enrollment.

The fee waiver exists, but it probably doesn't apply to you

Apple grants a fee waiver to recognized nonprofits, accredited educational institutions and government entities. All conditions must be met:

• be a legal entity, not an individual or a one-person business;
• not have signed the Paid Apps agreement, so offer no paid app and no in-app purchase;
• sell no digital goods or services in your apps.

If you want to sell a subscription, that door is closed. A nonprofit publishing a free app for its members, on the other hand, should check whether it qualifies.

Apple's commission on your sales

Once it's published, your app also pays on every sale. According to the membership page, the commission on digital goods and services is 30%, reduced to 15% for eligible subscriptions and for members of the App Store Small Business Program. This program is for developers who earned no more than $1 million in net proceeds in the previous calendar year. It's not automatic: you have to apply. If you sell subscriptions, apply from the start, otherwise you get 70% of the price in a subscriber's first year instead of 85%.

The hidden costs nobody puts in the table

Your time

This is by far the most expensive item. Learning, building, testing and fixing a first app takes weeks. A free tool that wastes ten hours of your time costs more than a paid tool that saves you twenty. For a full estimate, solo or with a contractor, read how much an iOS app costs.

The Mac

Xcode is free, but it only runs on a Mac. If you don't have one, Expo and EAS let you work from Windows and build in the cloud. The trade-off: you lose the local iOS simulator and the free testing path through Xcode. I explain what's still possible in publish an iOS app without a Mac.

The test device

The simulator doesn't replace a real iPhone: notifications, in-app purchases, the camera and performance have to be checked on a device. For other screen sizes, the simulator takes over.

The free path, step by step

Here's the order I recommend to get as far as possible without paying anything.

1. Create your Expo project with create-expo-app. If you want to test on your iPhone without a membership, pick the option compatible with the App Store's Expo Go.
2. Code and test with Expo Go, on your iPhone or in the simulator if you have a Mac. This is the phase where you build most of your screens.
3. Switch to a development build when you add a native module. On a Mac, Xcode installs it on your iPhone with your free Apple Account, reinstalling every 7 days.
4. Use free EAS Build for simulator builds and to get familiar with the configuration, keeping an eye on your monthly quota.
5. Hook up Supabase and RevenueCat on their free plans. You can set everything up in code before you have a single subscriber.
6. Pay for the Apple membership once the core feature works on your phone. That's what opens up TestFlight, App Store Connect and creating your subscriptions.

Step 6 is the real line. TestFlight is one of the tools reserved for paid members, as Apple's comparison shows. For what comes next, I described the setup in TestFlight: test your iPhone app.

That's the path I follow for my apps. The reasons behind this tech choice are on the mobile app with React Native and Expo page. The full method, from idea to publishing, is in how to make an app.

My advice

Making a free iOS app is possible while you're learning: build without paying. Pay the $99 when your app deserves to be tested by someone other than you. And if you plan to sell a subscription, budget for it from day one instead of looking for a workaround that doesn't exist.

If you'd rather start from a ready-made base, the iOS Kit bundles the Starter Code from my apps, subscriptions included, and a four-step path to follow at your own pace. The Apple membership is still paid separately, directly to Apple.

The free diagnostic costs nothing: it tells you what's blocking your project and sends you my checklist for avoiding Apple rejections. And the home page sums up the whole path to launching your mobile app, from idea to App Store.

Frequently asked questions

Can ChatGPT make an app?

It can write an app's code, and its agent Codex can edit your project's files. It doesn't compile the app, sign it or submit it to the stores: those steps are still on you. The tutorial "Make an app with Codex" walks through a first run.

What free software can you use to make an app?

To assemble without code, Adalo, Glide, Bubble, FlutterFlow and Thunkable have a free plan for building and testing, but none publishes to the stores for free. To have AI write the code, Cursor, Lovable and Bolt have a limited free plan. To code yourself, Expo, Xcode and Android Studio download without paying anything.

Can you make an Android app for free?

Yes for building it and testing it on your phone, with no paid account. To publish it on Google Play, you have to open a $25 account, paid one time, then pass a 14-day closed test with 12 testers if your account is personal.

Can you publish an app on the App Store for free?

No. Even a free app requires its publisher to be a member of the Apple Developer Program, at $99 a year. Only certain nonprofits, accredited schools and government entities that sell nothing are exempt.

Can you test your app on your iPhone without paying?

Yes. With Xcode and a free Apple Account, the profile expires after 7 days and you're limited to 3 devices. Expo Go, in its App Store version, also lets you test for free.

Is EAS Build really free?

The Free plan includes 15 iOS and 15 Android builds a month, in a low-priority queue. Builds for a real iPhone or for the App Store also require a paid Apple account.

Do you need a Mac to make an iPhone app for free?

Not necessarily. Xcode and the simulator need a Mac, but Expo and EAS let you code on Windows and build in the cloud. You do lose free testing through Xcode.

How much does Apple take on each sale?

The standard commission is 30%. It drops to 15% for eligible subscriptions and for members of the Small Business Program, if you apply, under $1 million in net proceeds a year.