Bahaa Al Zubaidi brings up an interesting discussion for his audience through this article. Creating an app for use by a business is a great idea. While developing an app, a decision needs to be taken on whether to develop a hybrid app or a native app.

It is important to know about both these types of apps and the difference between them.

Native apps

A native app is a software application that has been developed with a specific purpose. It is usually made using a software development kit (SKD) and made for a specific platform.

For instance, it is made using iOS SDK or Swift for iOS platform and Java development kit for Android platform.

It would be useful to understand the pros and cons of using native apps. The pros or benefit include:

  • Native apps are faster to use.
  • These apps can even work offline without internet connectivity.
  • When used to develop games and graphical applications, they tend to perform very well.
  • Accessing device features is easy with native apps.
  • Since it is being made for a specific platform it helps in creating the best user experience.

The cons of using native apps are:

  • Since they are made for a particular platform, if they have to be released for another platform it involves a lot of work.
  • Developing different apps for different platforms increases development time and cost.
  • The time to download is more.
  • The flexibility offered is lesser as compared to hybrid apps.

Hybrid apps

Hybrid apps are web apps but make use of the features of native apps. Just like native apps, they can be downloaded from the app store. They can access the device hardware and work similar to native apps.

The difference is that they are a general app that works on all platforms. They are not platform-specific like native apps. They are built using web technologies like Javscript and CSS.

The pros of hybrid apps are:

  • A single code base is used to create the app. This makes it convenient to use on all platforms.
  • Making changes is also easy. This ensures development costs and efforts are lesser.
  • Hybrid apps can access the device hardware just like native apps.
  • They offer the same user experience across platforms since they are made using the same code base.
  • The apps can be accessed online as well as offline.
  • They can also be run on web browsers.

The cons of hybrid apps are:

  • The app look and feel varies depending on the platform used.
  • They would depend on native plugins to access the device features.
  • The apps would need libraries and frameworks that have to be in sync with the latest platform versions.

Bahaa Al Zubaidi has clearly explained and outlined the pros and cons of Hybrid or Native apps. One should choose between the two based on their needs. Thank you for your time.

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