


a weather app would check the API of the current location’s weather service on both platforms and return different data according to what is available on each platform. Hybrid apps may look the same on both platforms but behave differently, depending on platform-specific APIs available to them. The trade-off is that these apps are cross-platform out of the box, which can be a significant time saver. WebView apps will have some limitations in accessing the device API out of the box, requiring additional effort to achieve some of the same functionality as native apps. WebView apps are hybrid apps that use embedded webviews to render their user interface, within which you can use HTML5, CSS and JavaScript for customization. the HTML/CSS/JS code) and this shared code runs in a webview on the target platform. This means that hybrid apps share some code across platforms (e.g. Hybrid apps are developed with a combination of web technologies such as HTML5, CSS and JavaScript.

(In this article, we are focusing on mobile app development we talk more about web and desktop apps here.) Hybrid Development What is cross-platform app development?īefore we begin, let’s define the term “cross-platform app development” and divide it into two categories: Hybrid Development and Native Development.Ĭross-platform apps are apps that can be developed using a single codebase and function virtually identically on both iOS and Android operating systems. These are the official Apple / Google software programming languages, respectively, which provides support and frequently updated features.Īlternately, you may use cross-platform frameworks such as Flutter or React Native. Swift and Objective-C for creating iOS apps and Java for Android apps. You can choose many ways to design and build an app. Consequently, there are apps for almost everything nowadays. Virtually all people on the planet have mobile phones, which means a nearly unlimited number of potential users. Why is mobile app development so popular?ĭeveloping mobile applications is a steadily growing business niche.
