Cross-Platform vs Native App Development: How And Which One to Choose

by Rob Stephen getaprogrammer

If you are planning to get your app built for your business and if you are confused between native or cross-platform mobile app development then here’s the guide for you. Explore the detailed comparison between the two and choose the right one as per your requirements.

Mobile applications have created a positive impact on worldwide businesses. Today, in this mobile era, where smartphones are dominating the market, mobile applications ensure to bring the maximum revenue to businesses. Smartphone users spend nearly 87% of their mobile time browsing apps for different purposes. And the reason is the ease of using applications. Mobile apps have brought almost everything right to the fingertips of people today. There are over 5.6 million applications on the App Stores catering to the different needs of people. Right from shopping to reading news, playing games, booking tickets, interacting on social media, and almost everything. This has made it imperative for every business to have a mobile app today to reach out to global mobile users and to expand businesses exponentially. Do you know that the global mobile application market is growing at a CAGR of approximately 18.5% since 2018?

However, though millions of businesses have already got their mobile applications built and launched, there are many that are still striving with their traditional business models. Those business owners should now plan to get their apps built. They need to have a clear idea of their requirements and accordingly choose the right platform and the right type of mobile app development for their project.

As per a recent Stats report, nearly 67 percent of the app developers prefer and suggest native applications while the rest prefer to go with the cross-platform application development approach.

Now, let's get to know each one of these two types of app development in detail.

Native app development

As the name clearly says it all, native applications are exclusively or natively developed for a particular platform be it iOS, Android or Windows. Native applications have access to the hardware of the devices including the camera, microphone, GPS, and the other native features of the devices. Hence, native apps ensure to offer high performance and enhanced user experience, acquiring all the native features and possible advantages of the devices. This is one of the main reasons why native applications are mostly preferred over cross-platform apps.

Cross-platform app development

Cross-platform application development is the approach where a single application is built to run on multiple platforms and to be compatible with all devices running on multiple platforms. Cross-platform apps render a native-like experience to the users but cannot access the internal features of the devices or leverage the advantages of the devices. But this does not mean that these apps compromise the application security factor. Besides, cross-platform apps are easy to maintain, affordable, and more stable. The business owners who choose to invest in cross-platform application development have the target of expanding their user base.

Native vs cross-platform application development

Here's a detailed comparison between native and cross-platform app development in terms of different aspects. Business owners can choose the right one based on these factors discussed below.

Development time:

Native app development is more time-consuming than cross-platform application development. This is because, in case of native application development, developers need to write the code from scratch every time the developer is building the app for a different platform. On the other hand, cross-platform application development works in the principle of "write once and run anywhere". Developers can just write a single codebase and can run the same for multiple platforms at a time. This reduces the development time.

Speed and performance:

The speed and performance of the application play a vital role in deciding the success and the future of the application. Native apps ensure better speed and performance as compared to cross-platform apps as they are natively built for a single platform. Native apps are faster and have less chances of getting crashed. But the cross-platform applications are often abandoned due to performance issues. These are comparatively slower.

Features:

Native applications have performance Software Development Kits that offer access to the APIs of the devices without any hassles. Moreover, unlike cross-platform applications, native apps also allow offline features. For cross-platform applications, there's no surety of getting access to the API of the device.

Customer reach:

The customer reach of the native apps is lower as compared to the cross-platform apps. This is because a single cross-platform application can be run on multiple platforms at a time thereby, giving more exposure to the app, targeting more audiences, and expanding the user base. Whereas in case of native applications, an app is launched only on one single platform at a time. Cross-platform apps are promoted across different platforms at once unlike the native apps.

Cost of development:

The cost of development of native apps is higher than a cross-platform application. If you are targeting multiple platforms and want to have a native app built for all the platforms then you have to get it done separately and that can cost you much higher than a cross-platform application that can be built using a single codebase and can be launched on multiple platforms at one go.

Both cross-platform and native application development has one or more pros and cons. You need to analyse your project requirements, your target audiences, your budget, and the other related factors to pick and invest in the right one among the two.

Rob Stephen is a dedicated app developer who has proficiency in both native and cross-platform mobile app developer is associated with the best app development company in Sydney, GetAProgrammer. The author has shared a detailed comparison along with the pros and cons of both native and cross-platform application development to help you make the right choice as per your preferences and requirements.