First published on tychelabs.net .

Trying to budget for an app after launch? Here is what maintenance covers, what six UK agencies publish, our own £550 a month plan and a step-by-step way to build your monthly figure.

Most app budgets stop at launch. The build is quoted, approved and paid for, and the line for what happens afterwards is either missing or a guess. Then the first iOS update breaks a screen, Apple changes a submission rule, a certificate expires, and someone asks how much it costs to keep an app alive.

This guide gives a straight answer for the UK in 2026: what maintenance actually involves, what we charge, what other UK agencies publish, and how to build a monthly figure for your own app. We publish our own iOS apps as well as building them for clients, so the examples are from apps we look after ourselves.

What "maintenance" actually means for an iOS app

An app that nobody touches does not stay the same. The platform moves under it.…