What Software Outsourcing Really Costs: 81 Quotes We Issued in 2026

In the Korean small-scale software outsourcing market in 2026, the median of the 81 unique quotes (duplicates removed) issued by Freesi (freesi.net) was 380,000 KRW (approx. USD 280). By type, web scraping and data collection came in at a median of 300,000 KRW (approx. USD 220) across 52 quotes, API integration and backend work at 1,500,000 KRW (approx. USD 1,100) across 9, and business process automation (RPA) at 400,000 KRW (approx. USD 290) across 5.

That sits some distance from the assumption that outsourced development means several thousand dollars. The reasons come later, but the caveats belong up front: this is not a market-wide average, it is one vendor's issued quotes; these are quoted prices regardless of whether the work was won; and our inbound skews heavily toward small, one-off jobs. Publishing those limits alongside the numbers is the point of the report.

One note on the unit: every amount here is a project total. Where a project was billed in deposit, interim, and final installments, it is still counted once, at the full project value. The median sits low because the sample is weighted toward small, one-off jobs — not because the figures are partial.

Types with fewer than five samples get a range only, no median. A median from a handful of quotes is noise, not information.

One caveat on tax: Korean VAT is excluded on the smaller quotes and included on some of the larger ones, so the basis is mixed. To read these next to prevailing market rates, the per-type rate ranges are laid out in SI outsourcing cost.

First, demand is concentrated under 1,000,000 KRW (approx. USD 720). Of 81 quotes, 52 were scraping or data collection, with a median of 300,000 KRW (approx. USD 220). Most real demand is one-off collection and automation — "pull competitor prices every morning," "give me this site's listings as a spreadsheet" — not multi-thousand-dollar system builds.

Second, the jump starts at API and backend work. The median goes from 300,000 KRW (approx. USD 220) for scraping to 1,500,000 KRW (approx. USD 1,100) for API and backend, a factor of five. The moment a server has to stay up and authentication, error handling, and security come with it, you have crossed from writing a program to operating a system.

Third, web apps and SaaS are a different market. Only three samples, but the range of 5,000,000–16,500,000 KRW (approx. USD 3,600–12,000) does not even overlap the other categories. Building a service with accounts, payments, and an admin panel is project-contract territory, not small-job outsourcing.

In this data set, analytics, dashboards, and monitoring accounted for three issued quotes ranging from 650,000 to 3,500,000 KRW (approx. USD 470–2,500). The sample is too small for a median. Prevailing market rates put spreadsheet-automation-grade work at 1,000,000–3,000,000 KRW (approx. USD 720–2,200), and a build that combines data collection with a dashboard at 3,000,000–10,000,000 KRW (approx. USD 2,200–7,200).

A fivefold spread inside one category is not about screen count. Three things decide it: where the data comes from (whether a collector has to be built), how often it refreshes (daily or real time), and whether viewers need separate permission levels. A single "revenue overview" screen fed by three different data sources carries the cost of three integrations. The detailed breakdown is in admin dashboard development cost.

Method: from the quotes Freesi actually issued between January and August 2026, we removed duplicates covering the same project to get 81 unique quotes, classified each by requirement type, and computed counts, medians, and ranges per type.

The limits, stated plainly. One, this is not market-wide statistics — it is one vendor's issued quotes. Two, these are quoted prices, not contract values; quotes that never converted are included. Three, because a large share of our inbound is small collection and automation work, the sample is skewed toward the low end. Four, the VAT basis is mixed across quotes.

We publish it anyway for one reason: buyers setting a budget have almost no access to numbers that were actually issued rather than estimated. If you cite this, "based on 81 quotes issued by Freesi (2026)" is the accurate attribution.

Applying the report to a real purchase is simple. Find the row matching your requirement, take the median as your anchor, and treat the range as your negotiating band. If a quote you receive lands well above the top of the range, chances are the requirement contains something that crosses a category boundary — an always-on server, multiple users, a permission hierarchy — so ask for that part to be quoted separately.

To see where your own project lands, the 30-second estimate narrows the range as you select requirements. Getting the estimate and not commissioning anything is fine — most of the 81 quotes in this report started that way, and we consider it a normal part of buying software.