In 2009, Garrett Camp, came up with the idea to create Uber. The primal idea was to make it easier and cheaper to procure transportation.
Camp had to spent excessively while hiring a private driver on New Year’s Eve. Camp had also found it difficult to hire rides in Paris when it snowed.
People caught on to the Uber model, improvised and built businesses around it. Build an Uber like app is gaining ground in many domains.
~ With inputs from Ashutosh (Technology Expert @Appscrip)
The secret of Uber is in its simplicity as it appeals to the basic needs of a human. You don’t need to wait and jostle with others for hailing a ride. Just touch your mobile screen and viola! The taxi is right where you need it.
No wonder many people want to build an Uber like app i.e. make a copy or clone it. The term Uber Clone became popular, trending in business circles.
What Is An Uber Clone?
It is a taxi booking app software that has all the features of Uber. Plus the customer can have add ons and extensions of their own. What better and faster way to launch an online taxi business than cloning the features of Uber? It saves you lots of time and loads of money too to build an Uber like app.
Small business owners, entrepreneurs, and startups in their quest to start their taxi business often seem confused on how to build an Uber like app.
At Appscrip, we have expertly crafted hundreds of taxi apps with our dynamic and powerful uber clone script. We have put in hours of research on what works in the taxi business and come up with a sterling product which we named KARRY.
Below we discuss the right technology choices we made in order to build an Uber-like app.
Right Technology Choices To Build An Uber Like App
Apps
Which design patterns should I use for Android Uber Clone? | Should I use Java or Kotlin?
Android apps are written in java with strict adherence to MVP architecture and support of the latest version – Android Pie.
Which language should I build an iOS app in? | Objective C or Swift?
Ios apps are written in Swift with strict adherence to MVVM architecture and support of the latest version- iOS 13.
Admin
What design patterns should I follow while designing an admin/web app for an Uber-like app? / Should I use Angular or PHP or React Native for developing web admin for Uber Clone? / Which web technology should I use for writing the web admin in Uber Script?
WebAdmin- Written in Php or angular js with strict adherence to MVC architecture.
Databases
What databases are recommended for an Uber Script? | SQL or NoSQL Database?
Use NOSQL – Mongo or Cassandra
Which database should I use for lower response time?
In Memory Database Redis or Amazon ElastiCache.
Use REDIS for High availability, Lua scripting, transactions, on-disk persistence, pub-sub system, versatile data structures, cluster support – used as an in-memory data structure store, cache and message broker for operations that require low latency.
Which database provides high fault tolerance, high availability and high performance to build an Uber like app? / How to make a highly scalable Uber app? / Should I enable clustering for databases?
Either of the following can be used –
Horizontally scalable MongoDB cluster with indexing, sharding and replica sets for high performance, fault tolerance and availability as the primary database.
Cassandra for elastic scalability, always-on architecture, fast linear-scale performance, flexible data storage (structured, semi-structured, and unstructured), easy data distribution, transaction support and fast writes support as the secondary database.
What is the most optimal way to send booking requests to the nearest driver (geospatial queries) in an Uber like app?
Redis for efficient geospatial queries.
Queuing & Messaging
How to handle a large number of bookings reliably in an Uber like app?
We should add a queuing system that acts as the buffer and decouples the sender from the producer of the data. It handles the mismatch in the rate of the incoming booking requests and bookings dispatched to avoid missing dispatch of any incoming booking request, during high volumes of traffic.
Which queuing systems should I use: Apache Kafka or RabbitMQ?
RabbitMQ is an asynchronous messaging broker and queuing system for queuing a large number of incoming booking requests. It provides reliability, including persistence, delivery acknowledgements, mirrored queues, publisher confirms, flexible routing and clustering for high availability.
Apache Kafka must be used as the distributed publish-subscribe messaging system because of its scalability, high volume data handling capability, fault tolerance, reliability, durability, performance, zero downtime extensibility and replication support.
It is ideal for log management systems.
API Backend
How to develop a fast, low resource consuming, highly performant and scalable backend for an Uber-like app? / Which programming languages are recommended for writing the APIs?
Which is more suitable for writing backend APIs? | Nodejs or Python?
NodeJS – As the primary language for all the Business logic APIs.
Node.js uses an event-driven, non-blocking I/O model that makes it lightweight and efficient, perfect for data-intensive real-time applications that run across distributed devices.
Python – For the APIs (heatmaps) which include a large number of data manipulations/computations/crunching operations due to its standard library being large and comprehensive.
How to develop a real-time analytics engine for an Uber like app?
Use Apache Flink as the distributed streaming data-flow engine (Realtime analytics)
Apache Spark as the cluster-computing framework (Machine learning)
Python for the analytics dashboard due to its claims to combine remarkable power with very clear syntax and a large set of pre available libraries.
Serverless architecture or cloud deployment?
We can go either way as each comes with its own set of advantages and disadvantages.
Serverless Architecture
Advantage – No pre-assessment of resources required and can auto-scale the resources allocated to the application based on surges in the incoming traffic volume.
Disadvantage – High cost and being a niche technology, it’s hard and expensive to find trained human resources/engineers.
Cloud Deployment
Advantage – Easy to get started due to the availability of a large number of trained resources.
Disadvantage – Pre-allocate the server resources which may lead to under or over-allotment of resources, both of them being dangerous leading to either failed requests due to insufficient resources, or higher price being paid for the resources which are never actually used.
What are the options available for serverless architecture for taxi dispatch software systems?
Amazon Lambda (with Amazon API Gateway) or Firebase Cloud functions.
Payment & Wallet
Which payment gateways should I use?
For the MENA region – Payfort
Europe/USA – Stripe/Braintree.
UK – 2Checkout, Authorize.net, PaymentExpress.
Canada – First Data GGE4, Moneris, PayPal Payflow Link, PayPal Payflow Pro.
How do I secure the transaction in taxi booking app software?
Use a payment gateway or a wallet with 3D Secure authentication enabled. Example – Stripe or Paypal’s Braintree.
Use encryption to store any client payment method/card details on the backend.
Never store any payment method secrets like CVV on the app side and their transmission should be secure and only over HTTPS.
Deployment
All the backend code is broken into several microservices and dockerized to achieve:
Higher Return on Investment (ROI) & cost savings,
Standardization & productivity,
CI efficiency,
Compatibility & maintainability, simplicity & faster configurations, rapid deployment, continuous deployment & testing, support multi-cloud platforms, isolation and security.
Should I use Docker/Kubernetes to build an Uber like app?
Kubernetes and Docker are both fundamentally different technologies but they work very well together, and both facilitate the management and deployment of containers in a distributed architecture.
Should I use Monolith or Microservice architecture?
A monolithic application will be much easier to build, make changes, deploy, and provide testing. The microservices architecture is more beneficial for complex and evolving applications. It offers effective solutions for handling a complicated system of different functions and services within one application.
Which method should I use for communication between Microservices?
gRPC- For inter microservice communication.
Also, Read | How are security features implemented in Uber-like apps
Security
How to make the Uber Clone app secure?
JWS (JSON Web Signing) + JWE (JSON Web Encryption) + JWK(JSON Web Key ) = JOSE (Javascript Object Signing and Encryption) for securing all the communication with the API backend using JWT. All the data exchange between product components like apps or backend should be over HTTPS and encrypted with SSL/TLS.
How to restrict/rate-limit the malicious traffic using an API gateway?
Should I use a commercial or an open-source API gateway?
Which are the popular opensource API gateways?
Open-source API gateways like Kong, Tyk, Kraken, Gravitee are equally good with their commercial counterparts, only thing lagging being the support.
Amazon API Gateway is the best commercially available enterprise API gateway in the market.
We use the fork of an open-source API gateway written in GO, with authentication server embedded in it to handle the token refresh and expiry, routing to microservices, rate limiting and handling authorization of the APIs.
How can I hide/mask my number from the Uber driver?
How to prevent drivers from interacting with potential customers outside the platform?
Through the use of “Twilio masked calling” which sets up phone number proxies to keep parties from knowing each other’s phone numbers during a call and helps keep transactions from happening outside the platform.
Real-Time Messaging
How to make a low battery consuming Uber-like app? /How to reduce battery consumption?
How to efficiently update the driver or passenger location when the app is closed or is in the background?
Which is the most scalable, low-cost publish-subscribe system, for real-time location update/tracking?
MQTT is the most battery efficient (Optimized for low battery usage esp. ideal for IoT devices), the open-source pub-sub system used for all real-time message transmission across the platform (apps, backend etc.).
Commercial pub-sub systems- PubNub or Google cloud pub-sub, Ably.
Example usage- Real-time driver location tracking while on a booking.
Firebase Services
How can I enable real-time chat between driver and customer within app/without leaving app/in-app in an Uber clone script?
Firebase Realtime Database – For implementing real-time chat between driver and customers.
How can I securely and cost-effectively store user media?
Firebase Storage or Amazon S3 Storage are the most popular enterprise-grade cloud storage available at very competitive prices. They can be used for storing and sharing user-generated content like images (e.g. license documents), audio, and video with powerful, simple, and cost-effective object storage built for Google/Amazon scale.
How can I view/log the app crashes?
Firebase/Fabric crashlytics as the primary crash reporter for the apps.
Notifications
How to send real-time notifications or run personalized or targeted marketing campaigns, offer exclusive deals to customers or incentives to drivers?
Firebase cloud messaging to reliably deliver push notifications to multiple devices in one shot.
Twilio Services
Which is the cheapest way to send SMS for number verification at the time of user signup?
Twilio SMS is the SMS platform for OTP number verification on user or driver signup.
How to add in-app calling in Uber-like app/ Uber Clone?
Commercially available Twilio Voice SDK or opensource solutions based on WebRTC (AppRTC or Janus) to enable in-app audio or video call between driver and customer.
Google Services | Build an Uber Like App
How to reduce the Google APIs cost/billing?
How to enable key rotation to reduce Google API usage cost?
Google billing management- to set up triggers when the allotted quota for a project is exceeded and rotate the API keys, to reduce the billing.
Google places API for searching the address while choosing a destination and while requesting a booking.
How can we determine the ETA for a trip?
How to calculate the shortest path/avoid traffic between a pickup and drop location?
Google Directions API for real-time path plot from pickup to drop location and ETA (Estimated Time of Arrival) estimation.
Customer Support
How to enable virtual customer support or add a ticket management system in taxi dispatch software or Uber Clone?
How do I automate customer support? How can I provide customer support without any human team? How do I reduce the cost of customer support while build an Uber like app?
Zendesk is a ticket management system for tracking, prioritising and solving customer support tickets. It can be used to reduce the size of the human customer support team by automating replies for the common customer queries and allowing customers to raise tickets for any of their grievances with the platform.
Today’s highly competitive market demands innovation and not just inspiration to build an Uber like app. The credit for Uber’s success also goes to the timing of the launch. No company was offering ride-hailing services at such a massive scale. Market conditions have evolved. Uber’s rivals have succeeded in snatching its market shares.
That’s why it’s important to enter into the innovation department. It’s important to give efficient projects the development time spin. It’s important to have the right taxi app developers on your team. Your developers shouldn’t only understand apps – but they should specifically understand the functions of taxi booking and be highly experienced in building technology with a lean process.
Innovation is an essential department at Appscrip, and we have worked with hundreds of taxi startups – helping them to bring their app ideas to life. Rather than blindly copying the Uber app functionality, why not establish an innovative and successful project?
- In 2021 Uber earned $17.4 billion revenue which was a 56% increase YoY.
- Uber earned primarily from mobility before the pandemic, but in 2021 its delivery business earned more revenue
- Every month in 2021, 118 million took an Uber ride or used Uber Eats delivery. This is a 26% YoY increase
- In 2019 6.9 billion trips were completed by Uber drivers which is higher than the 6.3 billion trips in 2021.
