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There are 3.48 million apps on the Play Store and 2.22 million apps on the app store available for download. Missing your presence on either platform will hamper your reach to the audience.
So, what is the problem with developing a mobile application for both operating systems? The issue is that small businesses with limited budgets can’t afford to hire two dedicated teams for Android and iOS app development.
These problems can be solved by cross platform app development frameworks that allow the creation of native-looking mobile apps for both Android and iOS using the same codebase.
Does the concept seem interesting? Want to read more on cross-platform frameworks? Here we have shared the 10 best cross-platform app development frameworks for Android and iOS. Before talking about them let’s first make you familiar with the benefit of such frameworks.
Why should your business choose a cross-platform app development framework? Here are a few reasons:
The hybrid development framework follows an approach: “Write once, run on different platforms”.
With the use of shared codebases, hybrid frameworks eliminate repetitive tasks and speed up development.
This is another win-to-win situation with the cross-platform mobile app development frameworks. Since single source code can be used to develop applications for Android and iOS, development efforts are reduced to 40 to 60%.
Plugins and extensions are a great way to improve the app’s functionality with minimal developer efforts. Hybrid mobile apps are compatible with the various plugins and they can be easily integrated with the help of the cloud thanks to the single source code.
Many users own more than one device i.e Android and iOS. With native mobile app development, it is hard for developers to sync design across multiple devices with similar experiences.
Cross platform app development tools allow developers and designers to build a uniform designing experience across multiple operating systems.
Due to the ever-changing business environment, it is essential for businesses to update their mobile apps regularly or frequently adopting the latest market trends to stay competitive.
Due to the complex coding of native mobile apps, the modification becomes quite difficult and time-consuming. With hybrid mobile app development tools, the developers need to make changes in single-source code which makes the modification process easier.
Flutter is an open-source app development supported by Google. It enables the developers to build, test and deploy feature-rich apps for mobile, web, and desktop from a single codebase.
Flutter is powered by the Dart programming language which is client optimized and prompts fast application development.
Irrespective of the development platform, Dart is fast on all platforms. When mobile and desktop are concerned Dart compiles to the ARM & 64 machine code. In the case of web development, Dart compiles JavaScript.
With automated testing and developer tooling, the development of a production-quality app becomes a lot easier for mobile app developers.
Features | Apps Powered by Flutter |
| Hot reload: Developers can preview the changes made to the coding instantly with immediate effect. |
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| Optimized for UI: Enables the mobile app designers to control every pixel of the design to create an adaptive design that looks and feels great on any screen. | |
| Full set of widgets: It offers the full set of widgets in Google’s material design and in Apple’s Style. | |
| Skia: An internal graphic engine to promote fast and well-optimized development. | |
| Simplified initial setup: With clear documentation and large community support, the Flutter installation process becomes a lot easier. |
React Native is a best-in-class open-source Javascript library created by the Meta platform for building beautiful user interfaces.
It follows an approach “learn once, write everywhere”. It allows developers to create native-like cross-platform applications with little effort.
Being powered by the lightning-fast programming language React Native, developers can preview the changes instantly.
Features | Apps powered by React Native |
| Community driven: React Native has the second-highest number of contributors on Github followed by VScode. |
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| Code reusability: Approx 90% of the code can be used to develop apps for Android and iOS. | |
| NPM libraries support: Thanks to the Node Package Manager, the installation of React Native is fairly easy. | |
| Upgrade helper support: This tool makes the process of transforming older written scripts to React Native much easier. | |
| Compatibility with third-party libraries: React Native rewards the developers with the freedom to improve the functionality of apps with the integration of third-party libraries. |
Xamarin is a free and open-source cross-platform app development framework supported by Microsoft that allows the building of Android and iOS apps using programming languages like .NET and C#.
Being integrated with the modern backend services, and native APIs, Xamarin allows the development of native, cross-platform, and shared native user interfaces.
Features | Apps Powered by Xamarin |
| Powerful libraries: Extensive collection of libraries to build feature-rich cross-platform apps. |
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| Free & open-source: Xamarin is free for all. There is no fee or licensing cost. | |
| Large and active community: Great community support to get answers to all your questions. | |
| Compatibility with Azure: With Azure support, developers can satisfy their needs for storage and intelligent services. |
Ionic is an open-source software development kit created by Max Lynch, Ben Sperry, and Adam Bradley for hybrid mobile app development.
It provides the mobile app developers with a great level of freedom by allowing them to develop the app using any frontend framework including Angular, React, and Vue.
Features | Apps Powered by Ionic |
| Pre-designed UI components: A vast collection of pre-build components, typography, and base theme that can be adopted on all mobile devices. |
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| Developer-friendly tooling: Live reload, deployments, and integrations tools make the developer’s process fairly simple. | |
| Blazing fast app development: Ionic offers up to 60 FPS scrolling on mobile devices. | |
| Simple and declarative UI components: All the components of Ionic are produced using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to enable developers to develop modern and high-quality UIs. | |
| Over 120 native device plugins: Rich libraries for native device plugins for making access to camera, geolocation, Bluetooth, and more a lot easier. |
NodeJS is an open-source cross-platform back-end JavaScript runtime environment created by the OpenJS foundation to support the development of server-side and scalable network apps.
It enables the JavaScript developers to write server-side coding alongside the client-side coding. By following the minimalist approach, NodeJS provides simple yet powerful ways of hybrid mobile app development.
Features | Apps Powered by NodeJS |
| Best developer experience is assured with NodeJS thanks to the least overhead and powerful plugin architecture. |
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| Enables developers to write reusable application logic. | |
| NodsJS can be easily integrated with several frontend frameworks like React, Vue, and Angular. | |
| Impressively speedy in the code execution process. |
Apache Cordova is an open-source hybrid mobile application development platform. It makes use of standard web technologies such as HTML, JavaScript, and CSS3 to develop cross-platform applications for Android, iOS, and Windows.
Apache Cordova offers two basic app development workflows: cross-platform (CLI) workflow and platform-centered workflow to enable developers to build platforms for multiple platforms by sharing a similar codebase.
Features | Apps Powered by Apache Cordova |
| Command-line interface (CLI): Responsible for making the development process simpler by building processes and installing plugins. |
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| Extensive range of Cordova plugins: Enrich the capabilities of the mobile app by integrating Cordova Plugins. | |
| Reusable code across platforms | |
| Support for offline scenarios | |
| Access native device APIs |
With Sencha Touch, developers can build and test data-intensive web applications across multiple platforms including Android, and iOS.
Relying on MVC architecture, Sencha makes use of programming languages such as HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to build mobile applications.
Features | Companies Using Sencha |
| Customizable UI widgets: It has a collection of more than 50 prebuilt customizable UI widgets. |
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| Code compatibility: The new version of Sencha offers smooth compatibility with the previous version of the framework. | |
| A robust data package enables the application to consume data from any back-end data source. | |
| Adaptive layout and animations ensure a superior experience across multiple platforms. |
Appcelerator Titanium is an open-source cross platform app development framework. It allows mobile app developers to develop apps in JavaScript, then compiled them into native apps for Android and iOS.
Besides the hybrid app development, Appcelerator Titanium can also be used to develop apps for one platform only.
Features | Apps Powered by Appcelerator Titanium |
| Over 5,000 APIs for iOS, Android, and Windows to build amazing apps with incredible credibilities. |
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| 60-90% code reusability to power the development of native-like app development with less coding for multiple platforms. | |
| Easy availability of marketplace modules to ensure the extended capabilities of your application. | |
| XML and CSS-like syntaxes to help developers make the layout syntax different from the business logic. |
NativeScript is an open-source app development tool that allows the creation of web and mobile apps with similar codebase for multiple operating systems.
Being supported by the WebIDE called PlayGround, which offers benefits such as hot reload, debugging, and an easy working interface to assist developers to create hybrid apps efficiently.
Features | Apps Powered by NativeScript |
| Rich animations, graphics, charts, and lists to deliver a magnificent user experience to the users. |
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| Touch manager to allow developers to deliver a polishing user experience to the users. | |
| Hot module replacement | |
| Easy authentication options with different sign-in methods | |
| Platform-specific APIs |
Corona SDK is a free and cross platform app development tool that allows the rapid creation of games and mobile apps for multiple platforms.
The framework is powered by the lightweight scripting language called Lua. By automatically compiling apps at the build time, Corona enhances the performance and stability.
Corona SDK’s development expertise does not limit itself to mobile devices; it allows developers to create solutions with a similar codebase that will work on desktops and even connected TV devices.
Features | Apps Powered by CoronaSDK |
| Completely free: No hidden fees, charges, and royalties are applicable on the usages of the framework. |
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| Extensive marketplace: Full project templates, graphical assets, music, and plugins are available for developers. | |
| Priority support: Offers support using the slack channels and directly through email. | |
| Call any native API: Be it C/C++/Objective C or Java, developers can call any native APIs with Corona. |
It is a full-featured HTML Framework for designing iOS and Android apps. Framework 7 CLI is an extremely powerful tool and the most recommended way to start Framework7 app development.
It allows to create projects with different variants to choose: Framework 7 – Vue, Framework7 – React; Target Platform: web app, PWA or Cordova app; Starter Template: Single Views, Tabs, Split View; Custom Color Theme; Generate required icons and splash screen.
Features
Apps Powered by Framework7
It is an open-source mobile app framework licensed to use it for free under MIT. Developers are required to make use of the Angular framework in combination with Bootstrap to build amazing mobile app experiences. However, there is no dependency on jQuery or any other Bootstrap libraries. Plus, there are several UI components like scrollable areas, navbars, switches, overlays and more that developers can use to build seamless mobile applications. Users will be treated with a smooth, intuitive and attractive user interface.
It is an open-source cross platform mobile app framework, relatively new, but good enough to compete against the likes of some well-established names above in this list. It features a large collection of ready to use components. Developers are enabled to write apps in HTML5 and JavaScript and combine the same with PhoneGap or Cordova to build a fully-featured app. It is free, easy-to-use, flexible and has semantic markup components for developers to get the benefits.
It is an HTML based, touch-optimized, JavaScript library used to make responsive websites that are accessible on all smartphones. It makes use of features of both jQuery and jQueryUI to provide API features for mobile web applications.
Intel XDK is simplifying workflow and enables developers to easily design, develop and deploy HTML5 websites and applications across multiple websites. Besides HTML5, JS and CSS, Intel XDK can help in creating, editing and simulating apps from an integrated development environment, export to Adobe PhoneGap or Cordova CLI for compilation into native code app.
Kendo UI is an open-source version of Telerik Kendo UI, which is a comprehensive framework for building modern web and modern apps with HTML5 and JavaScript. It comes with 40+ widgets and framework features, these widgets can easily be themed and styled via CSS, It comes with a templating library that performs faster than jQuery Templates, optimized animations leveraging CSS3 hardware acceleration and cutting-edge UI virtualization.
This tool is meant for those who do not wish to learn a programming language in order to create a mobile application. Mobincube allows internet users to create compelling mobile apps for free. With flexibility, functionality, and customizability – Mobincube helps the best mobile applications, compatible with any mobile and that can be successful across locations. It also ensures publishing apps across the Apple App Store, Microsoft’s Phone Store, and Google Play, etc.
QT is a cross-platform mobile app development framework that can be used to write applications once and deploy them across desktop, mobile and embedded operating systems. This removed redundancy. QT is partly C++ and partly native code. QT UI APIs wrap native UI components.
So, which framework have you chosen for your cross platform app development after reading their description and features?
Regardless of the framework you choose, you won’t be able to unlock the full potential of these frameworks without the help of an experienced mobile app development company.
Konstant Infosolutions is a highly experienced cross platform app development company. The company has developed a number of world-class apps using these frameworks. Let’s connect with us to unlock the full potential of your app development project.
The selection of the best framework is subject to your development requirements. According to a survey conducted by Statista in 2021, React Native is the most used cross-platform mobile framework followed by Flutter.
Java, C++, and JavaScript are the most commonly used programming languages for cross platform app development.
Manish Jain is the co-founder and Managing Director at Konstant Infosolutions. He is responsible for the overall operations of the company and has played a major role in bringing Konstant up from its humble beginnings and, with his immense energy and drive, transforming it into a globally trusted name in IT solutions.
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