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How to Create a Banking App?
11 OCT 2022

Mobile banking has firmly entered our lives. Clients hardly remember how ten years ago they stood in lines to transfer money or receive a salary. Now all operations with money are done in banking applications. Even a small banking business tends to create a mobile product just because clients are accustomed to using applications.


Of course, the pandemic has affected the growth of the mobile banking market. On the other hand, the trend towards digitalization of banks started even before 2020. One way or another, it is simply impossible to deny the importance of a mobile application for any bank.

If you own a banking business but still don’t have an app, this article is for you. Digitizing processes will not be easy, but as a result, you will get a tool that will attract more customers and increase profits. In this article, we will tell you what is going on with the banking application market and determine what features each bank application needs.

Breaking trends and fresh statistics of online banking 

Recently, there has been a real boom in the field of FinTech and banking technologies. 2021 has been a year of growth for online banking startups, as demand for digital banking has increased. What will happen to the digital banking market in the near future? What are the trends today? Let’s figure it out.

The most impressive statistics in our opinion: 90% of bank customers use mobile applications. Most often, users go to a banking application to check an account, track, or complete a transaction.

In terms of demographics, around 97% of millennials use mobile banking apps today, with 89% of all consumers saying they use mobile banking apps for a variety of financial management-related purposes. This shows that while younger generations tend to use mobile banking apps more than older generations do, the majority of consumers still rely on mobile banking. An increasing number of users of different ages, occupations, genders and other demographics will use these applications as technology advances, and their convenience makes them useful.

As for the market, here are some interesting statistics:
  • In 2021, the mobile app market generated $693 billion in revenue.
  • Finances Online statistics show that 244.2 billion apps were downloaded in 2020 – 7,727 installations per second.
  • Bank of America continues to lead the industry, with 30 million active mobile banking app users and over 40 million online banking customers.
  • In 2021, there are about 5.22 billion unique mobile users worldwide.
  • The total value of payments made using mobile devices in 2020 was $503 billion.
  • 79% of smartphone owners have used their device for online shopping in the past six months.

Current banking trends

One of the main trends in the FinTech industry is buy-now-pay-later (BNPL). Such a tool allows the user to split the payment into several parts. Unlike installments, customers do not have to pay extra money, so this model appealed to the audience. Banking applications implement such payment both internally and externally. For example, if a bank cooperates with a marketplace, then goods on this site can be bought using the BNPL systems.

Another trend closely related to the BNPL concept is embedded financial services. An embedded financial service is any type of financial product offered by a non-financial institution, such as a retail company, online platform, or simply a technology provider, instead of a bank or other traditional financial institution. Many clients have already used embedded finance. Those who don’t think so probably haven’t realized it just because these services are seamlessly integrated into the various platforms we all use every day.

The development of banking-as-a-service (BaaS) is another industry trend. More and more legacy banks are opening up their application programming interfaces (APIs) to develop FinTech and third-party applications. Traditional banks are increasingly allowing third-party vendors and FinTech to use their infrastructure and consumer data to develop new digital services.

While BaaS is still in its early stages of development, the UK has already adopted BaaS and open banking regulation, and countries around the world will soon follow suit. The most innovative banks are already taking advantage of this technology, and other incumbents are realizing they need to adopt more digital services and offerings to stay competitive in the industry or risk being left behind.

Top banking apps 

You need to study the market and competitors at least in order to find out what features other players in your field offer users. Here are three prime examples of banking applications. In fact, they have a similar user interface, but each has unique features. Let’s take a closer look.  
  • Ally
In the Ally Bank application, users praise the money saving function. There is an option for segmenting savings, which helps you save money for different purposes and control the budget without third-party services. Ally also has a Surprise Savings option that estimates how much you can afford to save on your checking account and then automatically converts the extra money into savings up to three times a week.  
  • Betterment
The Betterment app is suitable for travelers or businessmen with accounts in different countries. The application refunds all fees for ATMs and international transactions. Betterment also evaluates your checking account to determine if you have extra money; if so, it transfers it to your savings account.  
  • Capital One
Capital One is a large mobile bank, but it has branches in eight states in America. According to the 2022 JD Power Online Banking Satisfaction Study, the mobile app received the highest customer satisfaction rating among national banks. This app has everything you need in a quality banking app: you can send money to another person, keep track of your credit score, and get a good savings rate.

If you want to develop an application that will not be inferior to the top players on the market in terms of quality, write to us. Our managers will contact you.

Must-have features in each banking app 

The best banking apps have an easy-to-use interface that makes it easy to manage your account. With just a few clicks, you can view your account balance, deposit checks and contact customer support. In some apps, you can also do things like view your balance without signing in or keep track of your credit score. What other features does your bank application need? We answer this question on this block:  

✔️ Account Management

We already wrote that most mobile banking users go to the application to check the balance. Therefore, account management and control is the main function of any bank application. The user must freely open and close accounts, issue cards, and link new cards to the account. It is also important to make information about all transactions available and set up a convenient search for purchase history.  

✔️ Fast transactions

Customers of your online bank should not only keep track of transactions but also quickly complete them. Transfers to another bank, abroad or within your system — everything should work like clockwork. No banking application is complete without this feature. Users will not like to wait a long time for a transaction to go through. In the end, customers will simply choose another bank with faster processing speeds.  

✔️ User support

Customers may have a variety of questions, ranging from security to spending money. Your support must be available 24/7. It is not necessary to have a live operator on the line all the time. You can write scripts for frequently asked questions. Alternatively, it is possible to advance and personalize the user experience by using artificial intelligence in the form of a chatbot.  

✔️ Secure authentication and transactions

Transactions, payments for services and exchange of funds must be processed securely and carried out anytime and anywhere using a banking application. In addition, the process of entering the application directly must also be secure. Many banking apps use a password, fingerprint, or face ID to sign in.  

✔️ Map of branches and ATMs

You can not opt out of this basic function of mobile banking services. Only those who do not have physical branches can not make a map with ATMs. Otherwise, we recommend adding this feature to the application. This will improve user experience with the product. Customers will be able to find the nearest ATM fast if, for example, they need to withdraw or deposit cash.

Why can the development of a banking application be entrusted to an outsourcing team?

To create a banking app, you will need an experienced team of specialists: front-end and back-end developers, designers, testers, and project managers. Finding them all individually and putting them together on one team on your own is a rather difficult task. Therefore, to save time and money, development a banking app can be entrusted to an outsourcing team.

To find a proven team, you need to read reviews and look at portfolios. If neither is present, the company is most likely young and has little experience in mobile app development. To get high-quality app development services, it is important to find out which specialists work in the company and what projects they have already done. Remember that outsourcing app development to a company is a trend that even big companies like Google are following. So you get a well-functioning team of professionals and healthy communication with your project managers.

If you do not know where to look for a reliable contractor, write to us. Brivian is an outsourcing application development company with experience in creating products in various fields. Our experts will discuss your banking app idea with you and provide you with an accurate cost and development time estimate.

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