A Comprehensive Guide to Building a Car Rental App

The car rental industry has sky-rocketed in recent years. Allied Market Research reports that the global car rental market size might reach the $214 billion mark by 2027 which was earlier valued at approximately $93 billion in 2019. What’s worth noting is that it is growing at a CAGR of 10.7%.

The industry is showing staggering growth and is profitable enough to delve into. So, in case you are doubtful whether or not you should invest in car rental mobile app development or develop a car rental app, the above growth rate figure would have likely cleared that doubt.

Why Should You Create A Car Rental Application?

Multiple industries leverage mobile apps for their business and have benefited greatly. The car rental industry is no exception, with big names like Hertz and Turo already making their name in the market. You can create a similar sort of car rental application and allow users to book or rent a car within a few taps of their smartphones from anywhere in the world- quick and hassle-free. By establishing yourself as a car rental service provider and by providing users with some exceptional services, you can build a brand and gain a competitive advantage.

Moreover, there is an upsurge in the usage of such applications, so it would be a good time and opportunity for you to step into the market.

How Do Car Rental Service Providers Make Money?

You might be wondering how the car rental service revenue model works. It is basically classified into two parts-

1. Commission-based

Under this revenue model, the car owners registered with the service provider get booking from the latter’s app and have to provide a certain percentage of the total booking fee to the service provider. Car owners often hire drivers for this (to take daily bookings) and pay them a monthly fee.

2. Fleet model

Under this revenue model, the company or the service provider buys or leases a bulk of cars and assigns them to the registered drivers. The company collects the entire base fare on bookings and pays a monthly salary to the drivers.

Car Rentals Type

There are different types of car rental apps and services that cater to the varied needs of the user.

1. Self-drive

The self-drive service allows users to rent a car and drive it themselves. The booking charge entirely depends on the type of car they select and the number of hours it is being rented for.

2. Airport Transfers

This allows users to book a cab from or to an airport point, or you can say these are pre-arranged transportation for travelers between an airport point and their final destination, which could be a hotel or any other destination.

We developed a similar concept for one of our clients; one of the leaders in the travel domain. Find complete information in this case study.

3. Local

This type of service is availed by users who want to rent a car for a short period of time, such as for a few hours, to commute to the not-so-distant areas.

4. Outstation

Unlike the local car rental service, the outstation service enables travelers to rent a car for a longer period of time. This service is utilized when users are traveling to other states or cities.

5. Corporate

The corporate car rental service is used by clients or business professionals to travel for any business-related purpose.

What Features Should A Car Rental App Have?

Here are some of the features that you would often come across in a car rental app. You can start with these key features for your car rental app development and add more as the app progresses.

1. Car Listing

The app should display a list of cars that users can rent ranging from basic to premium, thereby allowing them to choose as per their needs, budget, and preferences.

2. Pick-up and Drop-off Place

The most integral feature of a car rental app, i.e., the GPS feature. Help users find the nearest car-rental pick-up and drop-off location by integrating the GPS functionality. Add Maps to your app to allow users to navigate there effortlessly. Do specify the pickup and drop-off timings!

3. In-built Calendar

The app should be integrated with an in-built calendar that allows users to select the preferred pick-up date and time. Moreover, it should have the option of specifying the number of hours they want to rent the car for.

4. Drivers’ Ratings

To further help travelers with their bookings, it is recommended that the app displays the driver’s overall rating alongside. This would let users know what kind of experience people had earlier with a driver.

5. Car Details and Location Sharing

This feature is extremely useful from the user’s safety perspective. The app should definitely have this feature where users can share their car details and live location to their friends or family right from within the app so that they can be alerted in case any mishappening occurs.

6. Easy Cancellation

A car rental app must allow an easy booking cancellation facility to the users so if in case there’s a change in their plan, they can either cancel or postpone the booking. In the case of prepaid bookings, you can specify the booking percentage fee that would be refunded if the cancellation is made within the specified time.

7. Easy Payment Facility

The app should encourage hassle-free payments. Integrate a secure and trusted payment gateway and incorporate multiple payment options including e-wallets so that users can choose to pay from their preferred payment method.

8. Seamless Booking System

The car rental app must possess a seamless booking system that allows users to rent or book or car within seconds and without any inconvenience. Moreover, users should be able to easily manage their bookings.

Other features can include an easy login facility, push notifications, fare calculation, etc.

Challenges

Before we proceed to car rental mobile app development, pay a look at a few challenges that may come across.

1. Competition

As we mentioned earlier, there are already some amazing car rental apps out there in the market. Though the competition is in every business today, you will have to work towards making your app better than the rest. It should stand out amongst the crowd.

Solution- Analyze your competitors, check out their apps, assess their strong and weak points, and see how you can provide a further better solution than them. The time that you spend on your research and analysis would help you a lot during car rental mobile app development.

2. Data Security

Mobile apps collect and process a significant amount of user data to provide them with the best possible experience based on their activities and preferences. Although data collection isn’t a new practice, the procedure should be secure so that the users’ information remains intact.

Solution- Check out the latest security standards and incorporate the essential ones in your app to ensure data security.

Read: Mobile App Security: What developers need to know to counter data security issues

Car Rental App Development Process

Be it any kind of app, there are primarily four stages involved in its development- Research and Analysis, Design, Development, and Testing.

To begin with, set your vision and define your goals precisely. Be very clear from the beginning about what kind of app you want to build, what features it should have, and what monetization model you are going to follow. Set a budget as well. Simultaneously, look for your target audience, find out what solutions they seek, and how your app is supposed to deal with the existing loopholes in these kinds of apps or be better than the rest.

Once you are done with business analysis, start designing the blueprint for your car rental app, which we technically call wireframes. This should be followed by creating mockups and prototypes.

Then comes the development phase where coding is done. Pick the right technology stack depending on the type of app you want to build and the platform you want to build it for (Android or iOS). The tech stack that you use would play a crucial role in successful on-demand car rental app development.

Once the app has been developed, test it thoroughly before publishing it. Bugs and errors are bound to occur during app development so make sure to fix them.

For a good overall app experience, ensure that the app is elegant from the UI/UX perspective. Stick to a specific color palette, keep in check the latest design trends and avoid too much creativity. Make it awesome but also keep it simplistic at the same time.

It would be excellent if you have an in-house team to do all this but in case you don’t, you always have the option to outsource. Dew holds expertise in different types of app development including car rental app development and is proficient in delivering quality UI/UX and QA services. You can reach out to us here and discuss with our experts the cost involved in car rental app development. They would provide you with an estimate based on your project requirements.

The car rental market is booming, and the demand for car rental services is growing vigorously. By creating a car rental app, you would not only leverage the growing demand but also fill the market gap.