Nearshore and Offshore Development
Basically, the ‘shore’ term in the phrases above relates to outsourcing software, web or mobile development to developers abroad. Knowing that there are markets with skilled and affordable talent, a lot of ventures, small business owners, scale ups and start ups decide to go this path and “outstaff” their developments to developers from abroad. So what about nearshore and offshore development?
Nearshore Development
Nearshore development agencies are basically located in countries with similar time zones or ones with minimal cultural differences. Technically, nearshoring works just like offshoring with a single difference being the location. We consider nearshore as everything within a 3 to 4 hours flight. In Western Europe, Central and Eastern Europe is considered to be nearshore. This not only puts the communication on a higher level – it also adds up the major cost savings and pretty much makes everything a breeze.
Offshore Development
Offshore development means hiring a team from abroad to do the work remotely. It is an option that supports your project needs – however, from further away compared to nearshore. India, Vietnam and the Philippines are some of the most popular countries for offshore development. Their cost can hardly be beaten compared to the onshore option which is normally far more expensive for many companies. Offshore IT development is also almost always cheaper than its nearshore equivalent.
