Everything cannot be the same. What’s a great decision for one company can be a bad fit for another.
This guide isn’t here to shame “build” or glorify “buy.” It’s here to help you choose the least painful path based on cost, risk, and time-to-ship, with a clear conclusion at the end.
eSignatures are everywhere: employee onboarding, hospital consent forms, vendor agreements, purchase orders, even a plumber’s inspection sign-off. When you add eSignature, you’re not just adding “a signature box.” You’re taking ownership of legal enforceability, identity verification, audit trails, security, uptime, and long-term maintenance.
Is eSignature legally valid
Most modern eSignature laws don’t require ink. They require intent, consent, and reliable records.
- In the US, the ESIGN Act says a signature/contract cannot be denied legal effect just because it’s electronic. (uscode.house.gov)
- In the EU, eIDAS defines different levels of electronic signatures and gives Qualified Electronic Signatures a strong legal standing. (EUR-Lex)
That “if you do it right” part is where build vs buy becomes real.
What are you really deciding when you choose build vs buy
You’re not deciding between:
- “Build a simple feature” vs “Pay a subscription”
You’re deciding between:
- Owning a regulated workflow (build) vs
- Renting a mature compliance + security + workflow engine (buy)
What do you need to build an eSignature solution in-house
If you build, you’re signing up for more than development. You’re signing up for ownership.
Beyond “a team of trustworthy nerds,” you typically need:
What people do you really need
- Backend + frontend engineers
- Security engineer (or security team involvement)
- QA + automation
- DevOps/SRE (uptime, monitoring, incident response)
- Product + UX (signing flow conversion matters)
- Legal/compliance support (contracts, consent, audit defensibility)
What capabilities do you end up owning
- Audit trail (tamper-evident logs)
- Identity verification choices (email OTP / SMS / IDV / KBA / etc.)
- Document integrity controls
- Time-stamping strategy
- Evidence packaging (for disputes)
- Key management / encryption at rest & in transit
- Access control & authentication patterns (NIST has detailed guidance on identity proofing and authentication assurance levels, which becomes relevant if you’re designing identity and access flows). (NIST Computer Security Resource Center)
What are the pros of building
- Full control over UX, workflows, and integrations
- Potentially lower marginal cost at massive scale (if you truly have very high volume)
- Custom compliance rules or niche requirements
- Ability to differentiate if signing is core to your product (rare, but real)
What are the cons of building
- Time-to-ship is longer than you think (signing is easy; evidence-grade signing is not)
- Hidden compliance surface area (consent, auditability, retention, regional legal requirements)
- Security risk is now yours
- The average cost of a data breach is measured in millions of dollars in industry reporting, meaning “one mistake” can erase years of savings. (IBM reports an average global breach cost of $4.88M in 2024.) (IBM)
- Maintenance never ends
- Browser changes, PDF rendering edge cases, deliverability issues, certificate/crypto updates, new regulations, new customer demands.
Build is usually right when…
- eSignature is a core product differentiator
- You need a highly specialized signing flow that vendors can’t support
- You’re operating at very high volume, and you have the team to maintain it for years
- You can commit to security + legal + compliance as ongoing investments (not one-time tasks)
What do you need to buy an eSignature platform
Buying is usually simpler than people assume.
What you actually need
Mostly:
- A clear idea of your workflows (who signs what, when, and where it needs to go)
- Someone to configure templates + integrations
- Procurement/security review (usually the slowest part)
What are the pros of buying
- Fastest time-to-ship (often days/weeks, not months)
- Compliance maturity is already built into the product design (audit trails, certificate handling, evidence logs, consent flows)
- Lower risk (you’re not inventing the legal evidence layer)
- Predictable cost (budgeting is simpler than hiring + maintaining a full signing stack)
What are the cons of buying
- Ongoing subscription cost
- Vendor dependency (pricing changes, roadmap changes)
- Some customization limits (especially for niche workflows)
- Integrations might be “supported” but not perfect for your exact stack
Buy is usually right when…
- You want to ship quickly
- Signing is a supporting function, not your differentiator
- You’d rather spend engineering time on your core product
- You don’t want to own legal/security risk end-to-end
How do cost, risk, and time-to-ship compare in real life
Here’s a simple, human way to compare.
How does cost show up
Build costs show up as:
- Salaries (and opportunity cost)
- Security reviews + hardening
- Ongoing maintenance
- Compliance/legal work
- Infrastructure + monitoring + incident response
Buy costs show up as:
- Subscription fees
- Implementation time
- Vendor security review time
A simple way to think about it:
- If your team spends months building, you’re “paying” with time + payroll + delayed revenue
- If you buy, you’re paying with cash, but you get speed and reduced risk
How does risk compare
Build risk
- Legal enforceability gaps
- Weak audit trails
- Identity verification issues
- Security incidents (and the downstream cost/reputation impact)
- Internal turnover risk (the person who built it leaves)
Buy risk
- Vendor lock-in
- Platform outages outside your control
- Procurement/security review delays
How does time-to-ship compare
- Buy: usually fastest, because the signing engine and evidence layer already exist
- Build: fastest only if you accept a “basic” version, but basic versions often fail when contracts are disputed
A simple decision framework (use this in leadership discussions)
Choose BUY if you answer “yes” to any of these:
- Do we need this live in weeks, not quarters?
- Is signing not our main product advantage?
- Would a security incident here be catastrophic?
- Are we trying to reduce engineering scope this year?
- Do we want predictable cost and less compliance burden?
Choose BUILD if you answer “yes” to most of these:
- Is signing central to our product value?
- Do we need unusual workflows vendors can’t support?
- Do we have strong security + legal support available long-term?
- Can we commit to ongoing maintenance for years?
- Are we operating at a scale where subscription cost becomes massive?
How can you embed eSignature into your product if you buy
A common reason teams hesitate to buy is:
“We don’t want users to leave our app.”
Good platforms support embedded signing, so the signing experience can happen inside your product while the platform handles the signing and evidence engine.
BoldSign provides documentation for:
- Embedded signing within an iFrame/popup/new tab
- Generating an embedded signing link
- Verifying webhook events (including the X-BoldSign-Signature header and HMAC SHA256 verification)
What is the simplest way to estimate “buy” cost before you commit
If you want an easy approach (without spreadsheets):
- Estimate your monthly signing volume (rough is fine).
- Run 3 scenarios: today, 2× growth, 5× growth.
- Compare that to “one team owning this for a year” (build + security + maintenance).
BoldSign offers both a pricing page and a pricing calculator designed for this kind of quick estimate.
Conclusion: Which is better, build or buy
For most companies, BUY is the better decision.
Here’s why:
- Time-to-ship wins: you get value now, not after months of engineering.
- Lower legal/compliance risk: eSignature validity depends on trustworthy records and processes (the ESIGN Act and eIDAS frameworks support electronic signatures, but your implementation still has to hold up). (uscode.house.gov)
- Security risk is expensive: industry breach cost estimates are in the millions, and this is not where most businesses want to experiment. (IBM)
- Maintenance is a forever-cost: buying avoids turning signing into a permanent engineering program.
Build can be the better choice only when eSignature is truly strategic (a differentiator), you have the right team, and you’re willing to own the security + legal evidence layer long-term.
Choose the smarter path forward with BoldSign. Add secure, reliable eSignatures to your product without the cost of building from scratch.
Related blogs
- Things to consider before selecting an eSignature API
- Customize eSignature Emails in BoldSign for Stronger Brand Identity
- Estimate eSignature Costs Instantly with BoldSign’s Pricing Calculator
Note: This blog was originally published at boldsign.com
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