What is a full stack developer? Someone who builds both sides of a website or web app. The frontend is what visitors see and click: pages, forms, the shop. The backend is what runs behind it: the database, user accounts, payments, emails and the admin screens your team uses. “Full stack” means one person can do both, so a project does not stall between a designer, a frontend developer and a backend developer.
What does a full stack developer actually build?
Take Mayabee, an online shop I built for a handbag and jewellery brand in Dhaka. One developer made all of this:
- The storefront: shop, filters, product pages, cart and checkout, in English and Bangla
- The PHP and MySQL backend that stores products, orders and customers
- The admin dashboard: orders, phone orders, delivery and cash on delivery, stock, reports and four staff roles
If those had been three people, every change to checkout would have needed a meeting. With one developer, a change to the order form and the dashboard screen that shows it ships together.
When is a full stack developer the right hire?
Hire one when:
- Your project is a business website, a store, a booking system or a first version of a product
- You want one person to ask when something is wrong
- The design, the code and the admin side need to agree with each other
Hire a team instead when the product is large, needs several specialists working in parallel, or has a long roadmap with many releases at once.
What should a full stack developer show you?
Ask for live projects you can click through, not screenshots. Then check how fast they load. Google’s published limits for a good page are a Largest Contentful Paint of 2.5 seconds or less, Interaction to Next Paint of 200 milliseconds or less and a Cumulative Layout Shift of 0.1 or less (source: Google web.dev, Web Vitals). You can test any site yourself on PageSpeed Insights.
By the numbers
| What | Number | Source |
|---|---|---|
| US monthly searches for “full stack developer” | about 8,100 | Semrush, US database, 23 Oct 2026 |
| US monthly searches for “what is a full stack developer” | about 2,400 | Semrush, US database, 23 Oct 2026 |
| Mayabee home page, mobile Performance score | 100 | Google PageSpeed Insights, 23 Oct 2026 |
| Mayabee largest content on screen (LCP) | 0.9 s | Same report |
What I would check before hiring anyone
- Can they show a project like yours, live?
- Do they build the admin side as well as the website?
- Will you own the code, the design files and the logins?
- How quickly do they reply, and in which hours?
I work remotely from Dhaka with a daily overlap on US, UK and Australian hours, and I answer within 24 hours. If you are looking for a full stack developer, see the web application developer and WordPress developer pages, or read the Mayabee case study.
Common questions
What is a full stack developer in simple terms?
A full stack developer builds both halves of a website or web app: what visitors see (the frontend) and what runs behind it (the backend, database and admin screens). One person can take a project from design to launch.
Is a full stack developer better than a frontend or backend developer?
Not better, broader. A specialist goes deeper in one area. A full stack developer is the right fit when the whole project is small enough for one person and you want a single point of contact.
How much does it cost to hire a full stack developer?
It depends on the project, not a fixed day rate. I quote custom websites and web apps after reading the brief, and WordPress builds start at $300, in US dollars, with the price in writing before work starts.
Can a full stack developer also design?
Some can. I design the UI and UX myself before building, so the screens you approve are the screens that ship.
Written by Sakib Islam, a WordPress developer who builds and looks after sites for businesses and agencies. About my work
