How To Become A Senior Mobile Developer: What It Is and Career Path

What is a senior mobile developer and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

3 min read

Quoted experts

Brian Glas,

Kevin Treu Ph.D.

Senior mobile developers design and develop applications for mobile devices. Your job will involve you interacting with your clients, taking specifications, features, and guidelines for them, and developing the applications to suit their needs. Your job description includes testing, coding, and debugging the application.

As a senior mobile developer, you will be required to oversee the process of developing the app right from the first meeting with clients to the presenting of the app to clients. This involves you mentoring junior developers, developing guidelines, and optimizing the quality of existing applications. You will also need to use Atlassian tools like JIRA to manage, monitor, and keep track of the project.

A senior mobile developer must be a problem solver. You must possess great communication, leadership, and analytical skills. Proficiency in web services, GIT, and java, cannot be overlooked. Your mean annual salary is about $110,000, and most senior mobile developers commonly have a bachelor's degree in computer science.

What general advice would you give to a senior mobile developer?

Brian Glas

Assistant Professor of Computer Science, Union University

Build relationships: Different technologies will interest and challenge you, but throughout your career, you'll find that it's the relationships that are the most important. This is harder to grasp earlier in your career, but much easier to understand after 15-20 years.
Gain different perspectives: Spend time with people in other roles that your job interacts with, and gain a solid understanding of how they view things; this is most valuable for career progression and understanding of how your work fits into the big picture.

ScoreSenior Mobile DeveloperUS Average

Salary

8.1

Avg. Salary $119,532

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

4.0

Growth rate 21%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

4.0

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.17%

Asian 29.82%

Black or African American 4.57%

Hispanic or Latino 8.33%

Unknown 4.84%

White 52.28%

Gender

female 16.07%

male 83.93%

Age - 38

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 38

Stress level

4.0

Stress level is moderate

7.1 - high

Complexity level

7.9

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

6.6

Work life balance is good

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a senior mobile developer

Explore senior mobile developer education requirements

Most common senior mobile developer degrees

Bachelor's

49.1 %

Master's

44.4 %

Associate

3.4 %

Start to develop specific senior mobile developer skills

Skills	Percentages
Java	9.96%
React Native	9.77%
Objective C	4.83%
Mobile Development	4.64%
GIT	4.35%

Complete relevant senior mobile developer training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 3-6 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New senior mobile developers learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a senior mobile developer based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real senior mobile developer resumes.

Research senior mobile developer duties and responsibilities

Used Atlassian tools such as JIRA to manage and keep track on progress of project.
Manage multiple web and database servers in multiple locations to ensure constant availability, functionality, synchronization and security.
Develop and design web pages using HTML, CSS including Ajax controls and XML.
Utilize expert knowledge of JavaScript, CSS and HTML to develop mobile applications for animal health professionals.

Get senior mobile developer experience

Generally, it takes 2-4 years to become a senior mobile developer. The most common roles before becoming a senior mobile developer include mobile applications developer, software developer team lead and java developer.

Prepare your senior mobile developer resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your senior mobile developer resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a senior mobile developer resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable senior mobile developer resume templates

Build a professional senior mobile developer resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your senior mobile developer resume.