You've got an idea. Maybe it's a booking platform, a compliance tool, or an app that solves a problem nobody else has cracked. The question isn't whether the idea is good. It's how quickly you can get it in front of real users to find out.
That's where MVP development comes in. And done right, it's faster and more affordable than most people expect.
MVP stands for Minimum Viable Product. It's the simplest version of your product that still delivers value to users. Not a prototype. Not a demo. A real, working product that people can actually use, stripped back to the features that matter most.
Here's how we think about it. Treat your first users like their house is on fire. What do they need before the fully featured fire engine arrives? Maybe just a bucket of water. Your garden hose. A fire extinguisher. Something that helps them right now, even if it's not the complete solution. That's what an MVP is. It's the thing you can give people to tide them over while you figure out exactly what the full solution looks like.
The goal is simple: test your assumptions before committing serious time and money. Does anyone actually want this? Will they pay for it? What's missing that you hadn't considered?
Building an MVP means you get answers to these questions in weeks rather than months. Those answers shape everything that comes next.
The longer you spend building in isolation, the more risk you carry. Markets shift. Competitors move. Funding windows close. And worst of all, you might spend six months building something users don't actually want.
Agile MVP development flips this on its head. Instead of trying to predict what users need, you build fast, release early, and learn from real feedback. It's not about cutting corners. It's about being smart with where you invest your effort.
At Shape, our typical MVP builds take four to six weeks. A four-week build starts at around £8,000, while a six-week build sits around £12,000, depending on what you need. That's not a rough estimate we inflate later. It's based on a proven process we've refined across dozens of projects.
If you're not ready for that level of commitment, we also offer a one-week build for £3,000. The scope is very limited and it won't be a full MVP, but it might be enough to validate your idea before going further. There's no contract or obligation to continue. Think of it as a low-risk way to test the waters and see if your concept has legs.
There are a few misconceptions that hold people back from taking the MVP route.
"It's going to be expensive." It doesn't have to be. A well-scoped MVP focuses only on what's essential. You're not paying for features you might need someday. You're paying for the features that validate your idea right now.
"The code will be throwaway." Not if it's built properly. We build MVPs with extension in mind. The foundations, things like authentication, databases, and infrastructure, are production-ready from day one. When you're ready to scale, you won't need a complete rewrite. You'll build on what's already there.
"We need all the features before we can launch." This is the trap that kills momentum. Users don't need everything. They need something that works and solves a real problem. The rest can come later, shaped by what you learn after launch.
Speed without a system is chaos. What makes rapid MVP development actually work is having a repeatable process that eliminates the slow parts.
We've built ours around a simple idea: don't waste time on setup.
Within minutes of kicking off a project, we have a live environment running. Continuous deployment, user authentication, database. All ready to go. No waiting around for infrastructure. No back-and-forth with DevOps. We go straight into building the thing that makes your product unique.
We use event storming to understand your business domain quickly. It's a collaborative technique that gets your team and ours aligned on what the product actually needs to do. No lengthy requirements documents. No endless meetings. Our team has done this many times across different industries, so we know the right questions to ask.
And yes, we use AI. But as a tool, not a replacement for expertise. It helps us move faster on repetitive work and explore ideas quickly. The decisions, the architecture, the user experience? That's still us.
This isn't theory. We've taken MVPs from concept to launch and then continued working with clients as their products matured.
For a health and pharma marketing agency, we built a compliance tool with checklist workflows, approval processes, and single sign-on integration. What started as an MVP became an essential part of how they operate.
For a salon business, we developed a custom booking app with integrated loyalty rewards. It was designed around their brand and their customers' habits, not a generic template.
For a construction services company, we built an AI-powered RFP review system that cut their bid processing time in half. A focused solution to a specific problem, delivered fast.
Each of these started small. Each of them grew because the MVP did its job: it proved the concept worked.
User-centred design isn't a buzzword we throw around. It's how we work. Every feature decision comes back to the same question: does this help the user?
This approach matters whether you're building for consumers, businesses, or the public sector. Understanding who's using your product and what they actually need is the difference between software people tolerate and software people love.
We've worked with organisations across healthcare, hospitality, finance, and more. The industries change, but the principle stays the same. Know your users, solve their problems, and don't overcomplicate it.
We're not dogmatic about technology. We use what works best for your project. That usually means Python for backend systems, Flutter for cross-platform mobile apps, Supabase for rapid database setup, and AWS for reliable infrastructure.
But honestly? You don't need to care about that. What matters is that the product works, it's fast, and it's built on foundations that will scale when you need them to.
If you're sitting on an idea and wondering whether it's worth pursuing, an MVP is how you find out. You don't have to bet everything on a hunch.
If you're a founder preparing to raise funding, a working product speaks louder than a pitch deck.
If you're a product team inside a larger organisation testing a new direction, an MVP lets you move quickly without committing to a full build.
We keep things simple. No jargon, no inflated timelines, no surprises. If you've got an idea you want to explore, get in touch. We'll tell you straight whether an MVP makes sense and what it would take to build one.
