Mobile Apps – Which technology is right for you

Mobile apps are at the top of every clients wish list these days. Often though, they have no idea why they want one, or what technology is best for building them. The purpose of this infographic is to help answer the question “which technology is best for my mobile app needs?”.

Definitions

Native – Native apps are built and compiled directly for a specific mobile platform. Native apps are not reusable and require a completely separate code base for each platform they are developed for. Natives apps are built in a language such as Java (for Android) or objective-c (for iOS) requiring specialized knowledge and skill to complete.

Cross-Platform – Cross-platform applications are built in a common enterprise language, such as C#, using a framework like Xamarin. These apps are compiled to native code and often result in performance that closely mimics that of native applications. These applications also have very complete access to native mobile APIs. The great benefit of cross-platform applications is that your developers can translate skills they already have into mobile applications with a much easier learning curve.

Hybrid – The hybrid model can be generally described as wrapping a web-based application in a native webview (or equivalent) control with a shim library being used for native device APIs. Hybrid apps do not stand up well to Native and Cross-Platform apps generally in terms of performance, but they do allow for quick app store deployment from an existing code base. Libraries such as the Ionic Framework will allow for better integration of native-like UI controls and ease access to native APIs.

Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) – PWAs are the new buzzword in the mobile development scene. A progressive web app is basically a regular web app, optimized for installation on a mobile device with the use of a service worker to handle caching for offline use and app updates. These apps provide an excellent mobile experience, without the red tape of the app stores. You get to keep all of your revenue, you can use your own business model and you don’t rely on Apple or Google to approve your applications.

Responsive Web Apps – Response web apps should be the default for all development today. There is no reason not to build a web site or application that is responsive to the device size. Responsive web apps allow a single code base to provide a high level of usability on any device.

Infographic – Which mobile app technology is right for me?

Mobile Apps – Which Technology to Choose (Click to Expand)

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