How Much Does It Cost to Develop a Candy Crush-Like Game App?

Candy Crush remains one of the most addictive and widely played mobile games globally. Its vibrant visuals, engaging candy-matching mechanics, and rewarding in-game feedback create an experience that consistently captures user attention. Beyond its entertainment value, Candy Crush also stands as a powerful example of the immense business potential within the mobile gaming industry.

As of 2024, the game has raked in over $1.09 billion in revenue and boasts 180 million active users worldwide — proving that the match-3 puzzle genre is not just popular, but incredibly profitable. For entrepreneurs and gaming startups, building a game like Candy Crush opens the door to a global user base, multiple revenue streams (in-app purchases, ads, etc.), and strong long-term engagement.

Factors Influencing Candy Crush Clone Development Costs

Several factors will assist you in creating a game like Candy Crush that enables effective budgeting and informed decision-making.

Game Complexity

Develop a Candy Crush-like match-3 puzzle game for your business? You’ll know the complexities of placing the right features that will disrupt your user experience and user engagement. Let’s discover what the things are that will make you crucially develop a Candy Crush game.

Game Mechanics

These gameplay mechanics match the same 3 candies to smash; you’ll get points. While playing, the players need to solve the difficult moves that take some boosters like power-ups, special candies, and using a lifeline, extra gaming moves, or time.

Game Levels

As of now, the Candy Crush game has 19,205 levels. However, every Wednesday, they typically release 30 to 60 new levels simultaneously. Therefore, you’ll start from 200 to 500 levels that require unique creativity, time, and expert game designers to create the complex game levels.

Game Modes

You can add additional modes to your match-3 puzzle game, like Candy Crush, which include timed challenges or limited-move levels, and you will increase complexity and costs.

In-app Purchases

Allow users to buy extra power-up stuff like additional lives, boosters, or any special items that create more engagement and generate more revenue for your game in the long term. If you include the special moves and power-up lifeline feature, you’ll likely incorporate proper payment protocols for making transactions regularly for users. Try out these payment processors like Stripe, Google Wallet, or Apple Pay to ensure compliance with your financial regulations, which facilitates safer transactions.

Social Sharing and Leaders Dashboard

Through these features, users can share their level achievements or wings with social friends or in-game friends. It enhances players' consistency in playing the game without distractions. Uplift your gaming platform engagement and monetization, which incurs a cost.

Targeted Device Platforms

Developing every simple game should focus on Android and iOS; in that way, you should focus on developing both platforms, or additionally include Windows or Mac OS platforms, which will take an extra investment. Developing this type of game for the iOS platform is more expensive than for the Android platform, and developing for both platforms takes a higher budget. A basic version of a platform app (Android or iOS) costs $5,000 to $15,000. If you choose to support multiple platforms, additional costs and expenses will be incurred for compatibility.

Graphics and Animations

High-quality visuals are crucial for a Candy Crush-like game. The cost depends on digital asset quality. Candy Crush is packed with numerous elements to make it a well-furnished, iconic game, including colorful, diverse candies, varied backgrounds, and engaging visual and sound effects. It takes roughly 2,000 visual effects, 2D and 3D images, colors, and GIFs to make an appealing way.

Sound Design

Audio is an important factor that will carry your game into the next level of experience, hitting the user’s dopamine and making it engaging, particularly in level winnings and smashing candies. For that, create different kinds of sound effects and tracks for candy matches or level completions.

Development Team

Due to varying team locations and expertise levels, development costs can differ. For example, your team size typically includes 4 to 6 people working for 3 to 6 months, which is common. With these members, you’ll need to develop your Candy Crush game, including developers, designers, a project manager, and testers. Here’s the development team cost by varying different countries

Social Media Integration

From this feature, you should be able to connect with your social friends on social networking platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and X. Through these connections, you’ll know the statistical data and leaderboards of your friends' game level progression. That will foster increased competition and enhance engagement with this game. However, integration also requires an additional investment to achieve it.

Candy Crush Clone App Development Cost Breakdown

Here’s a detailed cost breakdown that involved in developing a Candy Crush clone, based on industry estimates,

From above, this chart table is an approximate value based on the industry standards. It may cost $5,000 to $25,000 to build a single platform, for example, or it may cost up to $200,000 to develop a more feature-rich platform.

Backend Infrastructure Costs

These kinds of games require a robust level of backend infrastructure for processing so many things like managing user data, leaderboards, game progress, and in-app purchases to make it seamless. It involves setting up secure servers, databases, and cloud services; potentially handling high traffic; and being scalable for worldwide regions. Usually back-end development cost range is from $15,000 to $70,000 based on the user’s volume and tech complexity.

Ongoing Expenses: Marketing, Maintenance, and Compliance

Apart from that, development costs and ongoing expenses play a vital role in the Candy Crust game development. Every business needs an excellent marketing campaign and user acquisition after the public release. This involves running ads on social media, influencer marketing, and app store release optimization. Therewith you should spend around from $10,000 to $60,000, depending on your project scope and meeting the market competition.

Ready to Build Your Own Candy Crush Clone?

Creating your dream game like Candy Crush takes some technical obstacles and opportunities, but it’s a potentially revenue-generating and audience-attractive game worldwide. Developing a legendary puzzle game like Candy Crush costs starting from $30,000 to $200,000. This cost range is based on choosing the type of tech complexities, feature integration, design, testing, and deployment in the app marketplaces. Thereby, partnering with a reputable game development services provider like Appticz, we have a market-ready Candy Crush clone there. With this clone script, you’ll get a complete customization, bug-free, scalable, customizable, and hassle-free gaming experience.