Build vs Buy Calculator
The real cost of building in-house (most teams miss 40%).
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Project & team details
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How it works
Compares total cost of ownership across three models — in-house team, outsourced development, and hybrid — including hidden costs like recruitment, onboarding, benefits, management overhead, and long-term maintenance.
Frequently Asked Questions
- Build in-house when the software is your core product and you need deep domain expertise retained long-term. Outsource when you need to ship fast, the project is well-defined, or you lack the in-house talent. A hybrid model works best for ongoing products where you want internal ownership but external execution speed.
- Recruitment fees ($15K–$30K per engineer), 3–6 month ramp-up before productive output, benefits and overhead (30–40% on top of salary), tools and infrastructure ($2K+/month), and ongoing retention costs. Most teams underestimate total cost by 40% or more.
- Hybrid works best when you have a small core team (1–2 engineers) who own the product vision and codebase, paired with an external team that handles execution. This gives you speed without full vendor dependency, and the internal team retains knowledge for long-term maintenance.