Uber has been one of the most successful projects of the century. The innovative idea gave rise to a new industry for delivering the services at the doorstep. It is the second most disruptive company in the entire world. The company is spread over 80 countries and more than 900 cities. The global internet revenue of Uber was calculated to be 14.1 billion in 2019, which has grown much more than earlier. Car Sharing App is in trend now and current time’s requirement of the market.

Uber has been so huge success that most of the industries adopted the core idea and started services with Uber nomenclature. Since then, there have been many competitors of Uber, but Uber has been at the top for its valued services.

Groundwork

A few years back, one had to call a cab or taxi renting company for booking the cab. Or another option was to physically move out of your home and book a taxi at the taxi stand.  This is tiresome in bad weather conditions, and you don’t know how long it could take to catch a taxi. Also, charges are not fixed, which end up with overcharged customers. Uber solved this whole process online and made the taxi booking app transparent and cheaper.

Uber follows a simple approach, where notices a common pain point and develops a solution for addressing such issues. The constant effort of Uber revolutionized the taxi booking industry. Now the service has gained huge momentum and therefore you can see many similar apps in the market. Car Sharing app is playing a good role in the life of working people, who are going up and down from their home to their offices. The majority of entrepreneurs consider Uber idea a lucrative one to adopt and for the same, this blog brings a quick discussion about all an app wants.

Let’s understand how the Uber app works, what features are and how to develop them with the most approximate mobile app development cost.

How Does Uber Work? 

The customer requests a ride using the Uber app.

• Customer enters pickup and destination. Also, it chooses the car type and payment mode
• App searches for the nearest driver and forward request to the driver.
• Driver contacts and ride starts after sharing common OTP numbers.
• Pricing is transparent, the bill is generated for both through the app.

The driver may accept or decline the request, where the call is forwarded to the next available platform.

Upon finishing the ride, the customer can give feedback.

Benefits of Car Sharing App like Uber

Car sharing is not a new term. It has been there for a long, with a different name. People rent cars and share with the peer their over long distances. With the increase in traffic and due to busy roads, people started opting the rental cars, instead of using their cars. The trend is more prevalent because of the immediate solution to the problem.

Further, car sharing app is supported in society for:

• Reduction in CO2 emission
• Less congested road
• No worry about parking

It is true, that car sharing app is replacing car ownership tendency. Also, other eco-friendly ways are increasing. There is a great reduction in carbon emission and socially it is an appreciable effort. A shared car can keep 15 private cars off the road and this is a great move for reducing the road traffic. Also, urban areas face a lot of parking issue, which is solved by a car sharing app.

How Does Uber Services Work?

If you want to create an app like Uber, it is advisable to look at the current version of Uber. The existing Uber is complex and comprises several features, which may or may not suit perfectly to your requirements. But it can give a perfect idea of the things you can bring to the current ecosystem. Pay attention to the range of services offered by Uber.

Uber allows users to choose the type of car, which seems profitable to them. Noticeably, the taxi booking app options provided to users are majorly dependent upon the destination and route of the car. If we give a look at the Uber services in New York, you get the following options to choose from.

UberX: These are economic rides, which are available for economic rides. Users can book an entire vehicle.

UberXL:  This is an affordable ride that can be shared with 5 users.

Black:  Ubers offers this premium ride for users demanding luxury.

Black SUV: This is also premium ride, but with the sharing option for 5 users.

Car Seat: This is a car option, which offers a seat for the child.

WAV: These are wheelchair-accessible car rides.

An amazing business revenue model is there for Uber, where uber is connected to another app from the same company, known as UberEats. Users can switch between the apps smoothly. You can check and try this feature with the MVP introduction and get the user’s response for the same.

Car Sharing Business Models

Car sharing app like Uber is popular and offers several business model.

A few popular revenue models associated with the car sharing app are:

1. Station-Based

This business model depends upon the station-based infrastructure. Here, the company distributes the vehicles depending upon the business areas. The company can distribute the vehicle across the stations, where users rent out the car and pay rentals. You need not take care of collecting the vehicle in any location. It is a profitable business model but demands a great cost of setting up the stations and marketing them.

2. Free-Floating:

This is the most popular and widely used business model.  Here, users can take a cab from anywhere towards any destination.  They can book the book to any location and can leave anywhere they want. Users are charged for the distance they travel. For users,  it is a very profitable model but for you, some locations are not profitable.

3. Point A to Point B:

This is a restrictive model, where users can choose the specific route they want.  This is a more convenient model where you can stay more promised for the certain route of your vehicle.

Prominent Tech Features of Car Sharing Apps like Uber

Uber offers a smooth process of hiring the cab and no chance of fraud. Here we will understand all those prominent features of the car-sharing app.

1. Geo Location

Geolocation uses the core location framework for Google and iOS API. It detects the device’s location.

Navigating from one point to another is easy, where the driver can commute using GPS.

Map Kit is used for iOS users and Android API is used for android phones.

Uber contains an integrated Google Map for iOS and Android.

2. Push Notification

Once the ride is booked Uber keep updating the customer on different instances majorly:

• When a cab is booked
• When the cab reaches the pickup location
• When if the ride is canceled
• When the cab reaches to destination.

Push notification helps users to know the updates, offers and discounts available. Uber uses Twilio for notification. For iOS-based Taxi booking app development, you can use Apple Push Notification Service and for Android apps, Google Cloud Messaging Service is used. Push notifications are not considered a reliable way for communication, therefore messaging is used. Messages have a higher chance of timely delivery whereas notification reaches late.

3. Payment Gateway

On-demand taxi app solution like Uber uses a payment gateway for accepting the payment from card and wallets. The company needs to fulfil few requirements before accepting the payment from cards and wallets. These requirements are known as PCI requirements ensure safe and secure transactions and no third party intrusion.

Uber uses the payment integration provided by Braintree, whereas the famous on-demand app development solution Lyft uses Stripes for the same purpose.

Primary Features to Build a Car-Sharing App like Uber

Uber app is not a single app. When you start a taxi app development, it comprises three interfaces or maybe called three aspects of the app.

• Admin App
• Rider App
• Driver App

These three can be considered as a separate app, therefore we will study the features separately for each.

1. Rider App Features

Registration:

Users can register via email/ phone number or social media profile. Also, he can opt for different payment methods for the custom taxi app.

Taxi Booking:

Here, the rider or user can book a taxi, set the pickup location and choose the type of car it wants.

Calculate Fare:

It is a very handy tool, which instantly calculates the distance from the pickup point to the destination and gives an exact fare cost. The fare is also affected by traffic hours, weather conditions and time of booking.

Ride Tracking:

Users can view diver location on GPS, and d the estimated time of arrival and routes are shared with the rider.

 

Payment:

Cashless payment and in-app payment is featured for the rider. The rider can choose from different options such as wallets, PayPal, debit cards, net banking and credit card etc.

Driver Rating:

The user can give a rating for riders depending upon their behavior, riding skills and comfort of the ride.

Calling and Messaging:

Users can call the rider after booking and acceptance.

Ride Cancellation:

Users can cancel the ride within a stipulated time. If it is done late a particular amount is levied.

Payment Split:

If a ride is shared with another passenger, the payment can be split between two.

Booking:

Rides can be booked in advance and can be scheduled for a different time.

Book for Anyone Else:

You can book the ride for another as well from your smartphone. Be it your friend, relative or one time is known, it is possible to book the ride.

Discount and Gamification:

For wooing your customers and retain them, you can start games and other schemes. Where users can get discounts and reap advantages.

Voice Booking:

Users can also book the app using voice commands. The feature integrates the voice recognition technology.

Waiting List:

While in peak hours, user can book the taxi and request for the waiting period.

2. Driver App Features

Driver Friendly Sign up Portal:

Anyone could desire to join the team and ride car for your company. All walks of the society have different commitment. A new journey for earning revenue can be easy if the joining interface is easy and smooth. An account creation must be smooth, while saving the driver from technicalities. Along with details, social media login is must.

Profile and Status Management:

It gives the entire details about a driver in a custom taxi app. It shows the license, verification number, insurance and other useful information.

Accept or Reject Ride:

Driver should sense the feel of joining your team. A driver need to have the right of cancel the ride or accept it as per convenience. This can give a luxury feel to accept the ride.

Easy Access to Driver Dashboard:

Every driver need to maintain the well-managed profile. When a driver visits a dashboard, all important and urgent details  must pop up. Also there must be a smooth access to all navigations in dashboard.

Next Trip Alert:

This feature shows the alert for the next trip request. The driver can accept or reject the upcoming trip request depending upon the availability.

Plan ups for The Day:

Uber allows the driver to make an easy plan up for the day. With trip planner, driver can view the hourly trends, upcoming promotions, and set the ride limits.

Push Notification:

The driver also receives timely notification upon booking the ride and commencing the ride and upon reaching the destination. Also, he is notified of the best and less crowded routes.

Reports:

The driver can see his monthly earning and check the daily/weekly/ or monthly trips. Also he can be able to make short term goals with the help of reports.

Integrated Payment System:

The trend of hard cash is over. People like to maintain the transaction with electronic wallets, and other mobile cash payment systems.  Therefore, it is essential to take the service of their party payment system. This can leverage the easy payment using mobile wallets.

Waiting Time:

The driver gets the charges for waiting more than a specific time usually 5 minutes.

Next Ride:

The driver is notified for the next ride, even while he is completing the previous one.

3. Admin App Features: 

Ride Sharing Admin App is rich and comprises a complex system for monitoring ride activity in a ride-sharing app like BlaBla car. Admin needs to manage the large scale network and therefore a complex system is built for implementing proper management.

Admin app may contain following features basically:

Customer and Driver Detail Management:

An admin can edit, remove and maintain the derived and customer details. Admin contains the right to make edits to the public information with some constraints applicable.

Vehicle Detail Management:

Admin can view the information related to vehicle. For any requirement admin has right to fetch the vehicle details.

Manual Dispatch:

Admin can manually assign the trip request to the driver. This service is available for the areas such as outstations, where user cannot book the ride and send request for the driver.

Driver Transaction management:

Admin can get the complete transaction detail and total revenue, payable amount and all the driver details for the trip. Driver can also check all the amount that has been getting a fare from the rides with the help of ride sharing app.

Fare Management:

Admin can make changes to the base fare system, depending upon the area, and timing.

Interactive Dashboard:

Admin enjoys the clear view for admin and rider. Interactive dashboard is featured to make things easier for admin and enable him to take couple of decisions.

How to Start On Demand Car Sharing App Solution?

Car sharing app development is a huge task. You obviously need a development team/ hire mobile app developers, and the experts over individual areas. You need following skills in team to develop the app successfully:

• Android App Developer
• iOS App Developer
• Backend Developer
• UI/UX Developer
• Quality Assurance Analyst
• Project Manager
• Business Analyst

The average cost of app custom web application development and mobile app development is between $20 and $50. Here the cost of car sharing app development comes above $27600.

Verdict: 

Fleet management apps and ride-sharing apps like BlaBla car are very popular for several years. These apps could be the best chance for achieving huge benefits. Above we have discussed the salient features, but there is a lot left to be integrated. No app can survive on meagre service delivery. Instead, it needs to devise multiple operations for monetization. Revenue generation can be anything unless it annoys the user. Services make a custom web application development success, otherwise, daily apps rise and vanish.