What’s common between Gmail, Uber and Instagram?
These aren’t just apps popularly used across the globe, without which we cannot imagine our lives. All of them are hybrid apps.
This example shows us the ubiquity of mobile apps for everything we do and highlights the increasing popularity of hybrid app development services in today’s dynamic environment. More and more businesses today are opting for these services because of their viability in terms of development costs, time, and ability to scale.
With hybrid mobile app development, you can write code just once for apps that will run on it on both, Android and iOS platforms. Hybrid application development enables code reuse and drives greater developer productivity because they need to work on only one codebase for different operating systems. Now, we will walk you through how hybrid apps work to help you make informed decisions for your business.
What are hybrid app development solutions?
Hybrid apps, as their name suggests, include both, native and web app elements. Unlike native apps, hybrid apps offer cross-platform functionality, which means, developers need not build them specifically or individually for Android and iOS platforms. This is the foremost reason why they are so popular among today’s businesses striving to attain a competitive edge.
Now if you are wondering there is some magic that helps developers write code that works across platforms, it is in front-end technologies like JavaScript, HTML 5, and CSS. These popular technologies are the core of all hybrid apps and facilitate cross- platform mobile development.
Hybrid apps are characteristically known to be web apps that have a native shell, meaning their code runs in a container. When the browser engine of the device renders native APIs, HTML 5, and JavaScript, access to device hardware is enabled in mobile apps.
As far as performance is concerned, hybrid apps offer competent native-like performance. This has become possible because of the ever-evolving frameworks used for developing hybrid applications. Widely used frameworks for hybrid mobile app development include:
- CORDOVA: Open-source framework built with popular web technologies like CSS and JavaScript.
- React Native: Developed by Facebook, this framework helps you overcome a major limitation of hybrid apps by allowing you to choose native view.
- Xamarin: Owned by Microsoft, this framework helps developers use a single codebase for building Android, iOS, and Windows apps.
Native vs Hybrid App Development
Discussed below are major differences between native and hybrid mobile app development to help you get an idea of both these app types and make informed decisions for your project needs-
Development Effort
- It takes more development effort to build native apps because they need separate codebases for iOS and Android platforms.
- Hybrid apps take comparatively less effort to develop because a single codebase works for different platforms.
Programming language
- Developers need to use programming languages specific for each platform to build native apps (for example, Objective-C for iOS and Java for Android).
- Hybrid apps can be written with frameworks like React Native, which is a JavaScript framework for building native-like applications for Android and iOS using the React library.
App Performance
- Native apps offer excellent performance because they can directly access the target mobile device’s hardware and resources.
- Hybrid apps offer native-like performances by leveraging the frameworks mentioned above- React Native, CORDOVA, Xamarin, and so on.
Development Expenditure
- Native apps have longer development cycles because developers need to write code separately for each platform. Longer development cycles directly translate to higher costs for building a native app.
- Naturally, the hybrid mobile app development cost is less than the native app development cost. Code reuse means developers can deploy a single codebase across platforms and accelerate development, thereby reducing development costs.
Advantages of Hybrid App Development
Detailed below are the major benefits of building mobile apps for your business-
Quick Development
Hybrid apps take less time to develop than native apps because of their code reusability across platforms. Besides, a seasoned hybrid application development company ensures a faster development cycle with their nuanced understanding and knowledge of pitfalls to avoid while building hybrid apps. Accelerated development reduces your time to market and enables you to capitalize on opportunities available in the market.
Cost Feasibility
Hybrid apps give you cross-platform capability through a single codebase. It is also easier to roll out updates simultaneously across all platforms for hybrid apps. This is why they are cost-effective and an invaluable resource for businesses testing initial murky waters.
Scalability
The use of a single codebase and cloud native web technologies in hybrid apps make them a perfect choice for scale. Developers can easily scale hybrid apps built for one platform across others, and this ensures your business gets a wider reach, to users on all platforms without any massive investment in platform-specific deployment.
User Experience
Hybrid apps provide a seamless user experience with consistent performance irrespective of the device used. Digital natives expect seamless performance as they switch devices on the go. Expert hybrid app design services align business objectives with seamless user experiences and ensure adept integration of hybrid apps with external programs for smooth functionality, no matter what device a user opts for.
Conclusion
Hybrid app development has become a popular choice for developing effective and scalable mobile apps. Their benefits, as mentioned above, help businesses maintain a competitive edge by keeping up with evolving user needs and building a bond of trust. However, like any other development method, they have some limitations and are suited for specific use cases. But with the right hybrid application development company, you can overcome them and grow your business with top-notch hybrid apps.