Build vs Buy Analysis

Build vs Buy: Internal Developer Platform

Building a custom IDP costs $600K–$2M per year. Buying a platform product costs $2K–$10K per month. Here's how to decide what's right for your organisation.

🔨 Build

$600K–$2M/yr

Engineering time + tooling + infra overhead

Cost breakdown:

Engineering salaries (3–6 FTE)$600K–$1.2M
Cloud infrastructure$50K–$200K
Third-party tools & services$30K–$100K
Developer opportunity cost$100K–$400K

Pros

Full control over features and UX
Deep integration with internal systems
No vendor lock-in
Can be shaped to unique workflows
Builds internal capability

Cons

High upfront cost ($600K–$2M/yr)
18–36 months to production maturity
Ongoing maintenance burden
Risk of underinvestment / abandonment
Requires senior engineers to maintain

🛒 Buy

Recommended for most
$2K–$10K/mo

$24K–$120K/yr · vendor-managed platform

Example pricing:

Humanitec (orchestrator)$499–$2,000/mo
Port (developer portal)$499–$5,000/mo
Cortex (service catalogue)$500–$3,000/mo
OpsLevel$400–$2,500/mo

Pros

Live in weeks, not years
Predictable monthly costs ($2K–$10K/mo)
Vendor maintains and improves product
Built-in best practices
Frees engineers for product work

Cons

Vendor dependency and pricing risk
May not fit all customisation needs
Integration effort still required
Data portability considerations

Decision by Organisation Size

Org SizeRecommendation
< 50 engineersBuy
50–200 engineersBuy with customisation
200–500 engineersHybrid
500+ engineersBuild (with OSS)

5-Year Total Cost of Ownership

Build (200-person org)

Year 1 (build)$1.5M
Year 2 (stabilise)$1.2M
Year 3–5 (maintain + grow)$900K/yr
5-Year Total~$6.4M

Buy (200-person org)

Platform tooling ($5K/mo)$60K/yr
Implementation team (2 FTE)$360K/yr
Ongoing platform ops (1 FTE)$180K/yr
5-Year Total~$3.0M
See Tool Pricing ROI Analysis