This is a nonsense question with no real answer. It could be $0 to > $1,000,000,000,000. Are you building an MVP around a new cat-picture-sharing-website or an MVP around an idea for a new stealth fighter jet?
If you can actually say "Oh, an MVP, developed by a freelancer, will cost between $15,000-$30,000" (or whatever) then that's a damn sad statement about the state of startups. If we've become that homogeneous and generified in our efforts, what does that say about how innovative any of this stuff actually is?
Agreed. The insidious thing about this article, though, is that the author is feeding into startup-wannabe culture by catering to the question that is the first out of the mouth of the most clueless "idea guys". It almost seems like a ploy for page views given that the rest of the article is fairly reasonable and I have no reason to doubt the author's credentials.
The point of an MVP is to control costs, to avoid spending millions of $ and precious time to develop something that no one wants. The first step in avoiding spending that much money, is to be able to quantify the costs of building an MVP.
Besides, a stealth fighter jet cannot be a MVP. Maybe you have better maneuvering technology, or targeting technology, or maybe you have teleportation technology. That would be the basis of your MVP. If it still costs above $100,000, then minimize again, and again and again.
The point of an MVP is to control costs, to avoid spending millions of $ and precious time to develop something that no one wants.
I'd argue that it's the point of the process to "control costs, avoid spending millions of $ ..."
The MVP is just a tool, a step along that path. Its "point" if there is one - is to test your product hypothesis and evaluate product/market fit at a point in time.
The first step in avoiding spending that much money, is to be able to quantify the costs of building an MVP.
You can't do that, as you know neither the definition of "minimum" nor the definition of "viable" when you first start. That's the whole point of the iterative process. You start building to the Founders' vision, and then go out and try to find customers for that. It's only when you think that you have a testable product hypothesis that you can even speculate about what an "MVP" would look like.
I think part of the problem with these discussions though, is that "MVP" has become part buzzword and part synonym for "prototype" or "alpha" or "first version". It's not necessarily the same as those things though.
Besides, a stealth fighter jet cannot be a MVP. Maybe you have better maneuvering technology, or targeting technology, or maybe you have teleportation technology. That would be the basis of your MVP.
Right, that's why I said "an idea for a new stealth fighter jet". I certainly am not proposing to build a complete jet as an MVP... I can't imagine many - if any - scenarios where that makes sense. But building an MVP of the "magic sauce" that allows you to demonstrate to the DoD that your new stealth fighter jet will be better, is probably still going to be a lot more expensive than the "cat photo sharing site" thing. All I'm really saying is that there's a broad range in how much a MVP might cost, depending on the domain and the problems you're trying to solve.
I think you can hazard a guess that it's for building an MVP for a web product. An agency is unlikely to be able to build an MVP of a stealth fighter jet though they might still send you an estimate.
If you can actually say "Oh, an MVP, developed by a freelancer, will cost between $15,000-$30,000" (or whatever) then that's a damn sad statement about the state of startups. If we've become that homogeneous and generified in our efforts, what does that say about how innovative any of this stuff actually is?