App for China: How Much Does It Really Cost to Successfully Localize a Mobile App in 2025?

Localizing your app for China is one of the smartest moves for global developers in 2025. App for China strategies are becoming essential for international growth. In this guide, you’ll estimate the cost—from simple translation to full cultural adaptation—and learn what factors influence your budget.

READ MORE >>> What is the Role of Localization in Translation Services?

What Does Localization Include for an App for China?

Localization goes beyond simple text translation. For an app targeting Chinese users, localization may include adapting date formats, currency, color schemes, cultural imagery, and connecting your backend to APIs that integrate with Chinese social media (like WeChat or QQ). You may also need to replace Google Maps with Baidu Maps or connect to local app stores if you’re not publishing via iOS or Google Play.

🌱The starter package for a small app (U$50.00 up)

You recently launched your English app and would like to reach out to your Chinese audience. Your app analytics dashboard tells you there’s a sizable amount of users downloading your app, so maybe a translation of the text can be your starting point.

💲A small app with less than 500 words cost about U$50.00 or more. The cost only includes translation of texts, proofreading, and QA.
Previous projects: Targo WeissBeerger (mobile).

Why You Should Launch an App for China in 2025

If you’re serious about launching an app for China, understanding the market is the first step. China is home to over 1.2 billion mobile users…and one of the world’s most active app economies. With app categories like e-learning, fintech, productivity, and lifestyle booming, localizing your app for China opens doors to a vast audience. But without proper localization, even the best apps fail to engage or convert users in the Chinese market.

Simplified or Traditional: Which Chinese is Right for Your App for China?

If your audience is in Mainland China, Simplified Chinese is the standard. Traditional Chinese is used in Taiwan and Hong Kong. If your app targets both, you may need two versions.

📈The entrepreneur’s investment for a medium app (U$200.00 up)

Your mobile app perhaps may include more pages and nitty-gritty coding with a sizable amount of content with 2,500 words or more.

More complicated texts and content will require you to pay higher than this estimated package.

Aside from the translation, proofreading and QA are included in this package. App localization – adding a cultural touch – such as design, APIs for local social media platforms, colors, and among others – are not yet included.

🔵The colossal software for serious app developers and publishers (U$1,200.00 up)

💲If your mobile app has more than 20,000 words, this would probably cost about U$1,200 or more, which includes the translation, proofreading, and QA.

The localization of the app itself isn’t yet included here, and that requires another set of professional Chinese translators, developers, coders, to extract and work on the strings and codes of a large, complicated software.

However, you can save more money when translators use the CAT tools – the cost can decrease around 10% of the total cost.

As mentioned, these costs are estimates only and not intended to be the absolute industry pricing.

If you want to work on a more complex, detailed mobile app localization that requires professional translators, developers, designers, and proofreaders on mobile gaming apps or e-learning apps, expect that the cost could go higher because of the workload and skill sets needed.

Previous projects:

• Photomyne (mobile) 6526 + 2453 + 3390 + 435 words in Simplified and Traditional Chinese;
• MindLab E-learning 31563 / 52117 + 23000 + 1038 words;

Take note: The context of “words” here are the translatable words. Our team excludes all codes that do not need translation at all to save you cost. We make sure we protect all the codes from any tampering.

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Planning an app for China? Let us know, and we’ll prepare an affordable localization plan tailored to your app’s needs.

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