Health and well-being apps are becoming increasingly popular as people seek to take control of their physical and mental health. We explain what they are, the different types and how to create them.
What Are Health and Well-being Apps
Health and well-being apps are a category of mobile apps that relate to health and well-being. There are over 350,000 health and well-being apps available. Thousands of new apps in this category are released every day.
Types of Health and Well-being Apps
There are a wide variety of health and well-being apps and they can be broadly categorised into the following sub-categories:
Sports and Fitness Apps
These are aimed at helping you maintain and improve your health. They include functionality to track exercise.
Nutrition Apps
These help with maintaining a healthy diet. They include apps to help you track what you eat, calories etc.
Mindfulness and Self-Help Apps
These apps include apps to help the relaxation, meditation and mental health. They include hypnotherapy apps.
Sleep Apps
These apps help with people’s sleep. They include apps to track sleep patterns and help with giving you good quality sleep.
Medical Apps
Medical apps help provide access to medical services, online/virtual GPs, and remote monitoring of medical devices and data.
End of Life and Grief Apps
These apps help with end of life planning (including funerals) for a loved one or for coping with grief.
How Health and Well-Being Apps Help
Health and well-being apps can help people and offer several advantages:
- Save money – Sports and fitness apps can help save money as in some cases they can be used to replace people such as personal trainers and fitness coaches.
- Easier than talking – Some apps (particularly self-help and mental wellness apps) can be beneficial as they are less confrontational. You can use them alone, without having to talk to other people, such as therapists.
- Reduce pressure on medical professionals – Medical apps can help reduce costs and pressure on medical professionals. This is because they can optimise and make aspects of their work more efficient.
Health and Well-Being Apps vs. Websites
As well as health and well-being apps, there are many websites that are also in this category. Websites can work well for informational content (such as text and videos). However, apps offer a number of advantages:
- Make use of features on your phone – e.g. camera for video calls, GPS for fitness apps and number of steps walked.
- Connect to smart watches – e.g. Apple Watches, Fitbit etc. They can then pull in data that the watch records such as your heart rate and sleep patterns.
Cost of Health and Well-being Apps
The majority of health and well-being apps are free to download, although some are paid only.
Some paid apps offer a one-time payment option, while others require an annual subscription fee.
Of those which are free to download, most have in-app purchases to unlock additional or enhanced functionality.
When considering the cost of an app, it’s important to look beyond the price tag and consider other key specs such as user reviews, features, and usability. While some free apps may seem like a good deal, they may come with limited features or intrusive ads that can detract from the overall user experience
How to Create a Health and Well-being App
To create a health and well-being app you first need a good idea! You’ll then need to validate that idea – either yourself or via a service such as our mobile app idea validation service. It’s crucial to understand the target audience, their requirements and the competition.
If you’re happy, the app then needs to be designed, developed, tested, deployed to Android and Apple app stores and maintained. It’s important to ensure that your app complies with any relevant regulations, to avoid legal issues and maintain user trust.
The cost to create an app varies based on complexity – our prices start from £6,000 for a very simple app. It’s also important to have budget to market your app.
