It is no more rocket science to acknowledge that one of the most dynamic business tools in this era of technology is mobile applications, and with each passing day, it’s growing at a rapid pace. There are two renowned mobile app platforms for which most of the mobile apps are developed i.e. IOS and Android. 3.14 million apps for Google Play, and 2.08 million for the Apple App store were created.

Therefore, it’s difficult for a business to thrive for success in this complex hyper-competitive market without connecting with the right audience at the right time on the right platform. Businesses persistently search for technologies that can help them with multiple user bases. In addition to this, it’s predicted that by 2023, mobile apps will generate a whopping revenue of $932.5 billion. So it is time to get your Mobile App Development done.

In late 2018, Google launched the hybrid development framework flutter 1.0, providing native performance for android and IOS apps. The new-age businesses are more inclined towards hybrid app development as the development is cheaper and a single code line is used for multiple platforms.

So, is it better to develop two different apps with separate codebases or one application for multiple platforms? Let’s find out!

In this blog post we have compared vital criteria including performance, integration capabilities, cost, and much more for you, to choose either native or flutter technology is best for you!

Native Vs Flutter Technology

What are native and flutter technologies?

Native

Native apps are designed and programmed for specific operating systems namely IOS and Android. Simply put, a mobile application coded for Android in the Java platform will not work on the IOS platform. Similarly, IOS smartphone apps that are coded in Swift or Objective-C will not work on Android OS. Hence, for both platforms development varies. Below are some of the most commonly used languages and frameworks in native:

IOS: Swift, Xcode, and Objective-C

Android: Java, Kotlin, and Android studio

Used For: Gaming apps, GPS-centric apps, travel apps, AR/VR applications, and animation rich apps

Flutter

Flutter is a hybrid mobile application development platform introduced by Google; it's an open-source framework using the Dart language. To add, its improved UI toolkit is used to create cross-platform applications employing a single codebase. It proffers developers to develop flexible, clean, and expressive UI with native performance.

Used For: Huge data integration apps, material design apps, MVP apps

Application Performance (Native Vs Flutter)

Application performance is determined using several factors including raw speed and UI smoothness, “a fast app is great, but a smooth app is even better”.

Native - All thanks to native performance functionalities, IOS as well as android apps perform wonderfully, without any add-on library kits. Additionally, the native technologies built native apps outrank performance at 60 FPS (Frame per second) and 120 FPS when key animations are created for apps. Not to mention, heavy native performance apps can even utilize 118 MiB device memories which in long run may overload the end user’s device.

Flutter - Apps created with flutter technologies are highly optimized; by default, the objective of flutter apps is to render at 60 frames per second to 120 frames per second on most of the devices. All due to flutter innovative rendering mechanism, it doesn’t use UI components instead it utilizes a high-performance, battle-tested graphic engine called Skia. Google Chrome, Chrome OS, and Fuchsia are some prominent apps using the Skia graphic engine. Though the Flutter app performance is slower as compared to a Native app the speed difference is not visible to the human eye, unless you are talking about high performance gaming apps.

Integration Capacities (Native Vs Flutter)

Application integration helps in managing, maintaining, and keeping the application up to date along with reducing data redundancy.

Native - Based on the software design and pattern the integration capacities for Android and IOS according to their framework and their language differ. Simply put, most native frameworks such as Swift (used for IOS apps) as well as Kotlin and Java (used for Android apps) offer fast, safe, and seamless integration.

Flutter - Integration is not tough with flutter technologies. CocoaPods, AAR (Android Archive) are some add-on plugins are required for IOS and android respectively to integrate targeted features. Besides this, using flutter developers can integrate modules of the flutter project into any native apps.

Code Maintenance

Code maintenance is as vital as writing it in the first place as it is one of the expensive items in most software companies.

Native - Code maintenance is expensive and time-consuming in native technology, as programming will be done for the respective platforms. The developer has to maintain two unique codebases along with identifying bugs and problems and updating regularly. This also increases the cost of app development.

Flutter - Maintaining the code base in flutter is easy, because the developer is maintaining a single codebase for two applications. Additionally, due to this aspect developers can easily spot bugs and issues as well as easily support third-party libraries. Also, the hot reloading feature of flutter technologies immediately resolves the problems at hand. To add, hybrid apps are fast and reliable and render a native app-like user experience.

Cost Of Development

The cost of app development depends upon your budget, scaling aspect, and timeline, as it is a multi-step process!

Native - Small scale and company level apps are possible with native technologies to target IOS and Android users. However, either the two teams for IOS and Android will be required or a large development team. To add, this would be added to the project budget as native technologies follow the ``write twice, run twice" approach. So, for two different platforms, two different code bases and separate functionalities are the prerequisites.

Flutter - The approach abides by flutter technologies is, “write once, run anywhere”, allowing developers to write one code for two different platforms. Plus, development time is shortened with a significant reduction in development costs. Even a novice developer can easily be trained in flutter helping companies save money on hiring additional developers.

Should Flutter Be Your Next App Development Technology?

Choosing the right technology for building the mobile app can make or break your product/service's success. Moreover, do pay heed to other vital aspects like cost, requirements, and timeline, etc. for app development. Native apps are great for Gaming apps and applications requiring deep integration with Hardware features. For the majority of the applications, the best option to get all the major functionality would be to develop the app in Flutter, the framework offers a plethora of benefits to the business as well as its feature-rich. On top of this, if you are planning to switch to flutter, this is the right time!

If you are searching the internet for the best native app development company or a flutter development agency then you have landed at the right spot!

e Software Solutions is a full-stack web and mobile app development agency helping businesses of all sizes achieve the unprecedented success of their product/ services. No matter! Whatever your needs are, we design future-proof and innovative apps at affordable rates.