One of the main mobile app development trends that will surely stay in the market is hybrid mobile app development. A report by Statista shows so many choices of frameworks that will let developers build hybrid apps. However, React Native and Flutter were the top two hybrid frameworks in 2019 and 2020.
According to the above-mentioned report, 42 percent of global developers used React Native as their preferred Hybrid app development framework in 2019 and 2020. On the Second number, Flutter had a penetration rate of 30 percent in worldwide developers in 2019, which later increased in 2020 and touched a threshold of 39 percent of developers globally.
But we will not deny that there are other frameworks as well that can fulfill your hybrid app development needs. Apart from these two best hybrid app frameworks, many modern developers are moving towards other options like- Xamarin, Unity, Dojo, and Corona among others.
Important Statistics for Cross-Platform Mobile App Developers
Before we proceed further and talk about the benefits of hybrid frameworks and a few leading names in the market, let’s dive into some statistics from the same market segment.
- Android and iOS apps are responsible for 70 percent of online traffic (Flutter Community)
- 87 percent of mobile users spend their time on mobile apps (Comscore)
- Mobile app downloads are expected to cross a threshold of 258 billion by 2022 (Statista)
Benefits of the Hybrid Mobile App Development Frameworks
Before we proceed to the list of best app development frameworks, it is better to know about the functions of the best framework.
- Faster development is the main advantage
- The headache of rewriting codes from scratch for each OS will not exist
- It will be easy to find bugs in codes written on these frameworks
- Sharing of codes will be easier
- Already developed UI components saves time and codes on design the entire UI
Best Hybrid Mobile App Development Frameworks
Furthermore, we are going to pick a few best hybrid development frameworks from the app development industry and discuss them. We will take factors such as Popularity, review, and expert opinions into consideration to pick these revolutionary technologies of the modern mobile app development trends.
1. React Native
This Java-based mobile app development framework is quite popular among experienced developers and top app development companies. Famous brands such as Uber, Microsoft, and Facebook have already adopted React Native for their mobile app development needs. The hybrid framework possesses the feature of letting you build natively rendered iOS and Android mobile applications.
The native approach is a hack to work around pain points in React Native. Native plugins should be used to expose low-level general features that you can then build on top of from JS.? - Brent Vatne, Editor of Exposition (Source)
React Native has its inception history going back to 2015 when Facebook released it as an open-source project. Due to being used by one of the top social media companies, within a couple of years, React Native became popular among developers. Some advantages of React Native like creating code once for iOS and Android apps, and the freedom to create robust apps gave it a push on the top.
2. Flutter
This open-source hybrid app development framework is a child of Google. Commonly used for Android, Windows, iOS, and Linux app development, this framework is expected to leave React Native behind in the next few years. Google had released Flutter initially in 2017. There are two parts of the Flutter hybrid framework for which developers use it- Software Development Kit (SDK) and UI Library.
Flutter SDK has tools to assist developers in building apps for iOS, Android, or Windows among other operating systems.
UI Library has elements such as Widgets, buttons, and texts, among others, that developers can reuse.
3. Ionic
Popular brands such as NASA, and Amtrak among others are using Ionic to build high-performance mobile applications easily. This open-source framework is a perfect choice to build Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) and High-performance mobile applications.
The framework includes UI components, front-end building block libraries, and other design elements to build the best Android and iOS mobile apps. The framework uses the best programming languages in the market, such as HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
4. Xamarin
This open-source app development framework by Microsoft is used to build high-quality iOS, Android, and Windows mobile apps. The common features that Xamarin offers are Memory Allocation and Garbage Collection.
The hybrid app development framework lets users build mobile apps that will not require the rewriting of up to 90 percent of codes. Developers can write these apps on PC or Mac and compile them in .apk or .ipa format, depending on the target operating system. Developers can use this cross-platform app development framework to write cross-platform mobile apps with the C# language.
5. Kendo UI
This HTML5 based user interface framework helps developers in building cross-platforms with high performance but less development time. Its library includes more than 70 widgets and plenty of data visualization gadgets. If you want to build an app with advanced functionalities but in less time, Kendo UI is a perfect pick for you.
6. Unity
Unity is mainly used to develop cross-platform smartphone games. Initially, Unity Technologies released it in June 2005. The hybrid app development framework can help you in building a 3-D environment, elements, characters, and more. If you are into game development or work for industries such as Automation, Animation, or Marketing, among others- Unity can help you in building high-quality gaming apps. The hybrid framework can decouple the module dependencies in mobile apps by giving them an object at the runtime itself.
Key Takeaways on Hybrid Mobile App Development Frameworks
With time, the adoption of hybrid frameworks will increase due to their popularity among users that is increasing rapidly. Moreover, it also gives more benefits to developers as well. However, hybrid frameworks are not very ideal for heavy games and apps with too many features, as being cross-platform brings a few limitations for these hybrid apps.
Before we wind up this blog, let’s have a look at a few key points we discussed above for a revision:
- Hybrid apps are less costlier and demand fewer maintenance costs as well
- These apps save developers from rewriting codes from scratch for each operating system
- React Native is a Java-based hybrid app development framework
- Flutter is an open-source hybrid app development framework released by Google
- Ionic is being used by tech-giants such as NASA
Well, surely with time, there will be new names that we talk about in the future. However, for now, these hybrid frameworks can be trusted blindly. Hopefully, you got the information you were looking for
Until next time, Happy Programming!