Connecting People Wherever They Are
Let’s Turn Your App Idea into Reality
KW Works helps businesses reach their potential in today’s mobile world by connecting your staff and customers wherever they may be, at home, in the office, or on the go. Our mobile team combines deep technical expertise, strong design sensibilities, years of practical experience and an abiding passion to create superior mobile apps. KW Works specializes in integrating your mobile solution with your other digital assets, including websites, web applications, custom software, and legacy software systems. So that people can always stay connected with each other and your organization!
mo-bile app
/məʊbʌɪl æp/
noun : software used by people on small, wireless computing devices to achieve their goals
Once you have decided to go mobile, the first and most crucial decision is to determine the platform and technologies you want to target. Should you develop your mobile app for iOS or Android or both? What technologies should you use? Should you go native, employ a hybrid approach, or use an emerging new technology like the progressive web app (PWA)? How to choose? Feel free to drop us a line and we’d be happy to discuss options! We’ve also listed below aspects you might consider in your decision.
What Mobile Platform To Choose?
Native iOS Mobile Apps
Pros of iOS Native Development
Apple products are renowned for their reliable performance, attractive interface, and pleasant user experience. A mobile app developed using Apple’s native Swift programming language brings many benefits:
Broad user base in the US
More than 50% of all smartphone subscribers in the US use Apple’s iOS system. Tapping into this enormous market is attractive to both entrepreneurs and large businesses alike.
High Performance
Native iOS code enjoys direct access to the host’s operating system and functionalities. Easier interaction with the native features of the mobile devices enhances the overall performance of the mobile app, especially when rendering graphics or multimedia content. Building complex applications using native code typically reduces the risks of crashes or freezes.
Smooth, consistent, and “beautiful” user experience
The iOS environment offers a highly intuitive UI with excellent app stability and performance. Many users consider elements of the iOS user interface to be aesthetically superior. If app attractiveness is your goal, then the iOS platform deserves your consideration.
Cons of iOS Native Development
There are two primary drawbacks to developing a native iOS application are:
Missed Opportunities
Developing a native app for the iOS platform could result in missed opportunities, especially if other platforms are not taken into consideration. The reduced target market could lead to revenue losses for an organization.
Costly and Time Consuming
To avoid missing opportunities, creating native apps for more than one operating system can significantly prolong the development time and cost. The same code cannot be deployed on different platforms so more resources will be required to craft code for multiple platforms.
Native Android Mobile Apps
Pros of Android Native Development
Android devices are ubiquitous. While Android and iOS smartphones are virtually tied in popularity in the US, Android has a clear lead in world-wide penetration by several orders of magnitude. Like the benefits of going iOS native, programming in Android’s native Java language offers similar benefits:
High Performance
As with iOS native code, native Android Java code enjoys direct access to the device operating system and functionalities. Full and complete access to native system features enhances the overall performance of the mobile app. As with iOS native code, complex applications built with native Java code typically display a reduced risk of crashes.
Easier App Approval
Google’s Play Store, when compared to Apple’s, is somewhat more lenient with app submission guidelines and faster in granting approval for postings in the app store. This makes it easier for app developers to get their application live, often within a few hours when it often takes days for Apple.
Broad User Base World-Wide
Android devices are made by a variety of companies unlike Apple’s iPhones. They are often priced at a considerable discount to iOS devices. This has contributed to Android’s overwhelming global popularity. Recent numbers show that the number of Android devices exceeds 80% market share worldwide. If a global market is your goal, then the Android platform should be a top consideration.
Cons of Android Native Development
Drawbacks to developing a native Android mobile application mirror the challenges of developing a native iOS application:
Missed Opportunities
Developing a native Android app could result in the same missed opportunities is going iOS native, especially if other platforms are ignored. The reduced target user group could lead to a revenue loss for an organization.
Costly and Time Consuming
Creating native apps for more than one operating system to avoid missing opportunities will significantly extend development time and cost to develop multiple code bases.
Hybrid Cross-Platform Mobile Apps
Pros of Hybrid Mobile App Development
With native app development, developers must write code for each separate operating system. Hybrid apps employ a different set of technologies to capture much of the functionality of native mobile apps but offer a singled, unified codebase that runs on multiple platforms, including iOS and Android. KW Works develops using two hybrid cross-platforms: Xamarin and React Native. Hybrids offer some distinct advantages:
Native-Like Experience
Hybrid apps offer the advantages of native UI, access to most specific-device features, and most importantly, native performance. Hybrid apps bind to the same APIs and UI controls that are used to build native iOS and Android apps in their respective platform specific languages.
Broadest User Base
Hybrid mobile app development uses a singled codebase to target multiple platforms. This ensures the broadest possible user base for the app. Running on multiple platforms is an excellent means to achieve user satisfaction across varying devices.
Attractive Cost and Rapid Time to Market
The use of a singled codebase offers attractive savings in development time and cost, approximately half that of a native solution targeting both major platforms. Hybrids also offer simplified and more cost-effective maintenance and extensibility.
Cons of Hybrid Mobile App Development
Unsuitable for Apps with Heavy Graphics
Each platform has a different method for visually laying out graphic-rich interfaces and behaviors. Hybrids do a fine job for many standard, standard line-of-business apps, but they are not appropriate for graphic-rich apps like games.
Larger App Footprint
Hybrid apps are typically twice the size of native apps since they contain packages that include not only the app itself but also the libraries and hybrid runtime. A larger app means slower download and install times.
