The mobile app development business is booming, according to a recent study. Statista predicts that by 2026, the global mobile app development market will increase profitability by $565 billion. In addition, they estimate a compound annual growth rate of 6.58% between 2022 and 2026.
So, now is the best time to improve your company's mobile app development business experience or outsource your work to experienced mobile app developers.
There are three main types of mobile applications according to the technology used to create them:
- Native apps are designed for a specific operating system or platform.
- Web apps operate via a mobile browser. Web apps are responsive versions of websites that can run on any mobile device or OS.
- Hybrid apps are hybrids between native and web apps turned into native apps, which can have their icon or be downloaded through the app store.
We have three approaches to building mobile apps:
- A traditional one. It involves writing code, creating a layout, optimization, teaming, and other steps.
- Zero-coding. It doesn't require programming skills. It is like using Tilda to create websites: no CSS, HTML, or JS. You only need to arrange the blocks with content, set up the animation, and get a great website.
- Low-code is between zero coding and coding: you still have to write code, but not much.
Developing a turnkey application is a complex process involving a whole team of mobile app developers. The programmers write the backend and frontend, the designers create and deliver UX/UI, the testers check the bugs, the developers manage the whole process, the leads manage the teams, and the account managers communicate with the customers. Everyone works hard and is wanted.
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So how do you figure out which tools are the best?
5 Best Mobile App Development Software
Xamarin
It is a tool based on Microsoft technology guidelines. Currently, it has over 1.4 million developers in its community. It uses a unified C# language. Xamarin allows native building for target platforms and creating high-performance applications with a native outlook. We can classify such apps as native in terms of performance and user experience, specifically designed for iOS and Android. Although we can use it on all platforms, Xamarin allows creating a layer of UI code for a specific platform. Thus, Xamarin's cross-platform apps look 100% native on any device, providing the best user experience compared to standard hybrid apps.
- Unified technology stack.
- Near-native performance.
- Native UI.
- Hardware compatibility.
- Open Source technology with enterprise-class support.
- Full suite of development tools.
- Delayed platform updates.
- Limited access to open-source libraries.
- Basic programming knowledge is required.
- Not suitable for high-performance graphics applications.
- Bigger application footprint.
- Difficulties with Integration.
React Native
Facebook released React Native as an open-source tool for Android and iOS apps. React is very handy for creating little things like a mobile client of some website design. Plus, with a minimal amount of native code, you can implement some pretty good functionality.
- Rich user interface.
- Quick applications development.
- Cross-platform development.
- Strong community support.
- Easy to learn.
- Memory leakage.
- Slow app launch.
Flutter
It is a Google framework for building mobile applications based on the Dart language. It is cross-platform and allows you to compile the created project for three operating systems: Android, iOS, and Fuchsia. Flutter is favoured when you need to accelerate the development as much as possible. Dart is used to creating a mobile application with the description of the graphical interface and all its operational logic. Then, the result of the work is added to the native application, as well as pictures, fonts, and the like (of course, this process is automated).
- Promising and dynamic growth.
- In-house graphics engine.
- UI can be decomposed into separate modules.
Major libraries are available already. New ones are constantly being released.
The final installation package is more extensive because Dart virtual machine is added.
UI is created using code, which leaves a thinner line between logic and design.
Ionic
It is a promising framework for mobile applications based on HTML 5. It is built using SASS, which provides many UI components that allow the creation of interactive applications. As the official website says, Ionic is an SDK for creating hybrid mobile apps, a set of CSS and JS components built on AngularJS, SASS, and Apache Cordova. Ionic creates basic apps with a choice of templates (e.g., an app with a side menu, an app with tabs, Google Maps, a blank app); builds and runs in an emulator, on an actual device, in a browser; generates icons, slash screenshots, etc.
- Fast development and minimal time to market.
- Quick development and time to market.
- You can do most of the debugging in the browser (except for native smartphone functionality - here, you'll need to use your smartphone).
- You can develop iOS and Android apps simultaneously ( although there are some restrictions, such as platform features related to styles and plugins).
- Angular, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript skills are all you'll need to start building.
- Lots of UI components available and easy to use - cards, buttons, switches, segments, popups, input fields, lists, the grid of rows and columns, etc.
- Lots of plugins to enable smartphone features such as camera, fingerprint scanner, NFC, geolocation, sending analytics to Firebase, alerts, and deep links.
- Native plugins can cause trouble if any of the plugins used are conflicting or if one of them has a bug.
- The build can break for no reason if something is damaged in the original folder.
PhoneGap
This framework is not meant for creating an application but for packaging and releasing it. The paid program PhoneGap is on Cordova open source and is owned by Adobe. It is popular with many mobile app developers. Once you're done with the code, PhoneGap completes the rest of the work on the platform you're working with. Applications created with PhoneGap use a web view to deliver content. In addition, PhoneGap contains minimal web APIs to access mobile device features and allows you to write requested plugins.
About the author:
Janet Polson is a graduate of George Washington University in International business. She is an unspoken expert in the study of science and philosophy. Janet is also a blogger, author of tech articles and she works as business analyst at Computools. Follow her on Twitter.
