How Ionic Benefits Hybrid Mobile App Development Process

Ionic is an open-source framework used for creating hybrid apps that utilize a mobile platform’s Webview. These apps offer various advantages over native apps in terms of speed, cost, and platform support. The framework has facilitated the development of hybrid apps as they are written using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Besides, it is deemed as a UI framework that handles UI interactions of apps with support of native mobile components and elegant designs. Thus, we can say that Ionic emphasizes UI interactions and the look as well as the feel of the app.

Ionic also provides themes and components that allow hybrid mobile app developers to create apps having an intuitive and interactive user interface (UI). The framework offers both light and dark themes for mobile apps. And its features include typography, an extensible base theme, mobile components, and interactive paradigms that improve the app’s functionality. An Ionic app is developed through the Ionic command line (CLI) and requires a native wrapper like Cordova to operate as a native application. Also, the Ionic CLI comes with a built-in development server.

Why You Should Opt Ionic for Hybrid App Development Services

Easy to Adopt

Developing hybrid apps using Ionic is way easier if a developer has profound HTML, CSS, and JavaScript expertise. Besides, they can easily switch to Ionic if you need a quick and interactive app for your business.

Cross-Platform App Development

Ionic supports Android, iOS, and Universal Windows Platform (UWP) for creating a cross-platform app using the same code. Thus, it requires less programming, effort, resources to develop an app that runs seamlessly on multiple platforms, and have a unified look and feel.

Built on AngularJS

Ionic uses AngularJS, a widely used structure framework, to provide multiple functionalities using which designers can integrate appealing components into the app. Using AngularJS, Ionic also offers a robust structure that facilitates code management and improves the performance of hybrid apps.

User Interface

Ionic has multiple default CSS and JS components that cover the majority of requisites for hybrid mobile app development. These components include shape inputs, routes, tabs, sliding menus, sliding boxes, and more. The default styles are basic and smooth, and developers can redo them by adding pre-defined CSS classes to the component.

Utilizes Cordova Plugins

Ionic uses Cordova plugins to allow hybrid mobile app developers to access various components and features like GPS, Camera, Flashlight, and more. Such plugins help in building an app that can reach its maximum working capacity by using one or more of these features of an operating system.

Easy Testing

Testing a hybrid app is far easier with Ionic. QA engineers can test it on a desktop browser or even perform simulator testing for both Android and iOS using Cordova commands. Testing can even be done with a mobile browser or safari in iOS devices. Besides, they can directly test the app on the actual platform to get an idea of how the app would run.

Huge Community

Understanding the Ionic capabilities to get the most of the framework is the most challenging part while developing a hybrid app. However, Ionic has a huge community of active technology experts who help developers understand the framework’s ins and outs and provide solutions to every problem they face. Also, they keep on posting about the framework, Angular, and other related subjects on various forums to educate people in the best possible way.

Final Words

Ionic is an excellent framework for developing basic native functionalities within an app that operates across various operating systems. The framework also expedites the hybrid mobile app development process and reduces the need for maintenance. So, if you want to develop a quick app using Ionic, and make a statement in the market, invest in our hybrid app development services. Our experts have profound expertise in building high-performance hybrid apps using Ionic and technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.

Why You Should Choose Flutter for Hybrid Mobile App Development

In this fast-paced age, competition among businesses is harder than ever. They continuously seek new avenues to stay ahead of the curve. Since this a digital era, most of them invest in mobile apps to reach out to a diverse audience and extend their roots. However, due to ever-increasing technologies, it becomes difficult for them to choose the right one. For years, small businesses have counted on React Native and Xamarin for developing a budget-friendly app, but Google’s Flutter has now started making a statement in the mobile app market.

Flutter is an open-source hybrid mobile app development framework that helps build cross-platform apps using Dart programming language. The rising popularity of this framework is evidenced by the fact that it is now among the top-20 software repositories of GitHub. It achieved this feat within a few months of its release. Let’s explore what makes Flutter unique and why you should choose this framework for hybrid app development services.

Benefits of Flutter

Single Codebase

Flutter allows hybrid mobile app developers to create a cross-platform app using a single code base. It means that they don’t have to code separately for Android and iOS apps. This helps them to quickly develop it and improve its design, quality, and speed to elevate its installation rate.

Dart as a Programming Language

Flutter uses Dart as a programming language to provide certain benefits to the developers. First, Dart is Google’s in-house production, so it is best-suited for Flutter. Second, Dart uses a reactive framework and manages both backend and frontend on its own.

Use of Customizable Widgets

Flutter provides a comprehensive library of fast and customizable widgets that give the app a native-like feeling. In Flutter’s UI toolkit, the widget catalog is divided by category for easy usability. These widgets are integrated to create a highly portable and responsive app that operates on multiple platforms and layouts.

Native Themes for iOS/Android

Flutter offers different native themes for both operating systems. The theme elements, like icons, fonts, and patterns, ensure that both platforms provide users with native user experience.

Stateful Hot Reload

The “Stateful Hot Reload” or “Hot Restart” functionality of Flutter allows hybrid mobile app developers to view changes made on the app in real-time. This feature instantly refreshes the app UI like a webpage, helping developers save up to 40% of their time.

Multiple Packages and Extensive Community

Flutter has a plethora of open-source packages that expedite the mobile app development process. This library, supporting both iOS and Android, is growing rapidly with the help of the ever-growing developer community.

Powerful Design Experience

Flutter facilitates designing powerful UI experience of the app, thanks to its easy implementation of the design specifications. This immensely benefits the developers, especially when it comes to creating a native-like experience through hybrid mobile app development.

Easier Animations

Flutter has a 2D Flare tool that makes it easy to create spectacular and complex animations with vector graphics and run them in Flutter’s rendering engine. The primary goal of this tool is to minimize the time to implement changes that need animations.

Create Apps for Mobile, Desktop, and the Web

Announced at Flutter live 2018, Hummingbird enables hybrid mobile app developers to use the same code to develop apps for mobile, desktop, and web simultaneously.

Final Words

With ample benefits, it is no surprise why some of the giants, like Google Ads, Alibaba, and AppTree, have developed their apps using Flutter. On top of this, the framework is backed by Google, which means you will never have a lack of support. So, considering Flutter hybrid app development services can help you quickly step into the market and gain a competitive edge.

Native, Web, or Hybrid Mobile App Development: What to Choose in 2020?

Mobile devices have reinvented the way people go online. The Statista reports that the number of smartphone users in 2020 is 3.5B, which translates to 45.04% of the world’s population. This number is likely to increase by several hundred million in the coming years, making smartphones a primary way of going online.

Businesses devising to capitalize on this trend are encountering the challenge of understanding the diverse and ever-changing mobile ecosystem. The surge in smartphone adoption and the evolving user behavior is affecting the mobile app development process. One of the most challenging decisions you may face is whether to go with the mobile web app, native app, or hybrid mobile app development.

Mobile Web App:  A web application is basically a mobile-friendly website developed using HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and probably other web technologies. Users access the mobile web apps using a mobile web browser.

Native App: A native application is developed for a specific platform using programming languages supported by the platform, such as Swift for the iOS platform and Java for the Android platform.     

Hybrid App: A hybrid app is a mobile web app that runs natively on an operating system (OS). Developed using HTML, CSS, and Javascript, hybrid applications are further wrapped in a native shell, which can be deployed to multiple mobile devices.

Once, the distinctions between mobile web and native apps were very clear. However, the increase in hybrid mobile app development is changing the decision matrix. Some of the important considerations that can facilitate decision making are explained below.

Device API

The device API allows a mobile application to interface with the device’s hardware and native functionalities like push notifications, GPS, camera, dashboard widgets, and contact. Earlier, this was deemed a major benefit for native applications. But now, hybrid apps utilize native shells to access the full device API. However, mobile web applications have limited native access because they use the mobile browser’s device API.

Speed

Native applications run faster across all the operating systems. On the contrary, hybrid and mobile web apps operate on top of the extra layers which consume computing resources and reduce the app speed. However, a general thumb rule is that unless the application is graphics intensive, speed should not be a major concern for hybrid or mobile web apps.

Development and Maintenance Cost

Development cost is the key advantage for hybrid and mobile web applications as they can be developed once and then deployed to all major platforms. However, deploying a native application to iOS and Android requires writing two different codes for both the platforms.

Besides, native apps incur high maintenance costs since they need quick updates when new versions of the OS are rolled out. Similarly, mobile web and hybrid apps also need to be updated when new versions of the release, but the mobile browser or the shell makes this task easier.

Development process

Since mobile web and hybrid apps are typically built using HTML, CSS, and Javascript, their development process closely mirrors the website development process. Developers can leverage an array of libraries and hybrid app frameworks to develop an app for specific or multiple platforms.

However, the options are limited when it comes to native app development. In this case, cross-platform deployment requires separate applications for each platform. Thus, the development process becomes time-consuming and expensive in the case of native apps.

Offline functionality

Native apps can easily store and retrieve data on the devices so that users can access them even when they don’t have an internet connection. Similarly, hybrid apps can function without the internet because they run in a native shell. However, most web applications face difficulty in functioning when there is no internet connectivity.

Time-to-Market and Distribution Method

Mobile web and hybrid apps have faster time-to-market as compared to native apps. Besides, a hybrid app can easily be distributed like a native app (via an app store or direct download) or mobile web app (via web browsing). Thus, we can say a single codebase has ample benefits when it comes to go-to-market time and easy distribution.

Final Words

The final decision depends on your business goals and requirements. But hybrid app development is the only approach that can yield you the benefits of both the mobile web and native apps. Faster time-to-market, lower development and maintenance costs, wider audience reach, and intuitive features and UX are some of the advantages of hybrid apps. So, if you think hybrid apps can suffice your business requirements and yield you intended outcomes, approach the experts of our hybrid app development company.

Top 7 Benefits of Hybrid Mobile App Development to Businesses

In this age of technological growth, the demand for mobile apps has increased drastically. They help businesses to gain a much-needed competitive edge in the market and drive their growth. Thus, mobile apps have evolved from being a simple app to a mission-critical platform.

Mobile applications are generally categorized into two types – Native app and Hybrid app. The choice of the app depends on business goals and user expectations. While Native apps are developed for a specific platform, hybrid mobile apps are known for their adaptability across various platforms. This concept boils down to building a single application that operates seamlessly on Android and iOS.

Below, we have outlined the key benefits of hybrid mobile app development and why it is a perfect fit for your business.

Advantages of a Hybrid App to Businesses

Low cost

Since hybrid app development is a unified approach, you don’t have to spend separately for creating different apps for different platforms. Hybrid app frameworks allow developers to build a single app version, along with writing and maintaining individual codebases for multiple platforms. Thus, this approach can help you save a significant amount of money.

Another secret benefit of this approach is that you can release the MVP to hit the market before your competitors.

Native Experience with Simple Backend

A hybrid app provides excellent user experience like a native app, along with simplifying the backend structure. You can consult with a hybrid app development company to choose the best hybrid framework and create a UX that connects to device-specific functionalities. Also, the UX of a hybrid app stays seamless while fixing bugs and updating the app, and users feel no difference if they shift from one device platform to another.

Enhanced UI/UX

Consistent performance and attractive designs are two key elements that drive more users to an application. With hybrid mobile app development, you can ensure appealing and intuitive UI/UX on each platform. Due to this, these apps are more welcomed to the app store and play store than native apps. Moreover, users don’t encounter issues like low performance or loading time while using a hybrid app. This makes the hybrid app a preferable choice for businesses that seek maximum user engagement on both Android and iOS operating systems.

High-Speed Performance

Hybrid applications have set mighty standards in terms of speed and performance. In fact, they run even faster than responsive and progressive apps, owing to no dependency on network communication. Besides, a hybrid app exhibits high speed on all devices, even if there is a massive amount of traffic. For instance, Twitter and LinkedIn, which handle an overwhelming amount of users, have proven their high speed and performance standards.

Offline Support

Like Native apps, hybrid applications also use the device’s API to store useful data offline. This feature benefits those users who have limited data consumption plans, live in underdeveloped areas, or have a connection that often gets interrupted. With offline usage capabilities of a hybrid app, users can still access some of the app’s features even if there is no internet connection. Thus, they can use your mobile app without frustration.

Ease of Integration

Since hybrid apps use the device’s programming language to synchronize with other compatible applications, developers don’t have to face hassles associated with the integration. As a result, hybrid applications work perfectly with cameras, messaging, GPS, and other device’s environment to deliver the best user experience. This can also contribute to enhancing users’ satisfaction as well as their reliability on your app.

Easy Maintenance

Easy maintenance is another advantage of hybrid mobile app development. For native applications, the app developers have to introduce new versions with each update. Also, users have to update their apps with the release of every new version. However, a hybrid app avoids versioning and makes app maintenance as easy as updating a web page, that too, in real-time.

Final Words

Due to the fierce competition in the market today, it is imperative to invest in the approach that demands lower cost and offers more benefits. Hybrid apps not only resolve the issue of targeting different platforms with different apps but also help in finding the quickest spot in the online app store market. So, if you want to stay unparalleled and grow exponentially, collaborate with an experienced hybrid app development company.

An Ultimate Guide to Developing a Healthcare App

Mobile applications are propelling technology adoption in the healthcare sector. Today, we can witness a myriad of apps that are actively contributing to the betterment of people’s health while improving and streamlining medical services. According to a report, the global mHealth apps market is anticipated to reach $11.17 billion, exhibiting a growth of 21.1% CAGR by 2025.

To contribute to this market and improve ROI, many hospitals, medical institutes, and physicians have embarked on an app development journey. These apps not only enhance the well-being of people but also help medical professionals reach out to more and more people. While mobile apps offer enormous benefits in improving patients’ health and driving interoperability, one needs a meticulous approach to building a comprehensive app solution.

A Step By Step Guide to Building a Healthcare App

In today’s fierce competition, standing out from the crowd, reaching out to the target audience, and increasing the installation rate are not easy to achieve. So, starting on the right foot is extremely important as a task well begun is truly half done. Below is a step-to-step guide that you should follow to penetrate the healthcare market and make headway with your app.

NoteTo create a cost-effective app and quickly step in the mHealth app market, we suggest to approach a reliable Hybrid app development company.

Brainstorm and Validate the App Idea

The key to a successful app lies in knowing what problem are you going to solve with your app. Focusing on the purpose instead of the product will lead to an app that your audience actually needs rather than that you think users want. Also, conduct thorough research to gather knowledge about the healthcare market, existing mobile apps, and make a list of features that you should incorporate into your application.

Furthermore, make sure not to create an app similar to one that already exists in the market. However, if your app functions similarly to an existing app, it should have some features that set you apart from the competition.

Some of the key features of a mHealth app are:

  • Record Accessibility
  • Minimal Data Collection
  • Limited Access and Permissions
  • Secure Authentication
  • Application-level Security
  • Clear Communication and More

Decide the Platform for App Development

Once you elucidate the problem, target audience, and app features, determine the platform for your app development.

Android, iOS, or both??

To decide the platform, you should introspect on your business requirements and the resources. Native iOS and Android applications offer an improved user experience (UX), but they also need a lot of time and resources to create an app for both platforms.

You can prioritize one platform first based on your target region and preferences of your target audience. However, if your audience is spread across a range of devices – both iOS and Android – incline to hybrid mobile app development. It is budget-friendly and works seamlessly across multiple platforms.

Hybrid app frameworks like React Native, Ionic, and Flutter accelerate the app development process as they allow developers to deploy a single codebase simultaneously in both the platforms.

Determine the Approach: Going All-inclusive or Building Incrementally

Everyone dreams of developing their business app that is all-encompassing and has the perfect set of features. However, following an MVP-first approach can contribute more to your app’s success.

A minimum viable product (MVP) is your basic app version that has all the core features and is devoid of additional features that can be incorporated later during future iterations of the app.

Since apps like Facebook, Uber, Instagram started as MVPs, following their footsteps will definitely land you to a better beginning. It will also expedite your time-to-market, give you an opportunity to validate your idea and add features as per the users’ feedback to the future version of your application.

Firstly, bring the simplest version of your healthcare app in the market, and then align it with your future, feature-packed vision by developing incrementally.

Design and Develop the App for an Excellent User Experience

The user experience can make or break an app as it has a significant impact on its usability as well as user engagement. Apps that offer sub-par user experience have more possibilities to end up being uninstalled. So, pay more attention to the UI/UX of your healthcare app as it not only needs to works well but also needs to look well and attention-grabbing.

Besides, adopting an iterative approach and developing an app in distinct modules allows the developers to make changes without affecting the overall functionality of the application. Ensuring integration with frameworks and third-party APIs that already exist fastens the app development process by eliminating the need for reinventing the wheel.

Most importantly, app integrations with EHRs and EMRs are essential to driving healthcare interoperability. Considering the innovations in the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT), connecting the app with fitness wearables and leveraging the collected data to achieve outcomes is also something you must take into account. Modern healthcare applications can also exploit AI algorithms to use the data to obtain insightful and actionable inferences.

Pay Attention to Testing

The bar for quality, security, and accuracy for healthcare apps is quite high. So, the testing phase of your app should leave no room for bugs and errors. Below are the quality assurance aspects that your software testers need to consider before releasing the app.

Data Security – Since healthcare data is more prone to hacks, identifying and eliminating all the areas of vulnerability in the testing phase is crucial. Encrypting data through a transport layer security will facilitate data validation in your healthcare app.

Data Privacy and Confidentiality – Set up strict authorization and access control measures within your app to make sure data is received only by its intended recipients.

Usability— Usability problems in your app can result in clinical issues impacting the outcomes of the patients’ health. Even a small issue encountered in the app will be a turn off for the users. So, meticulous testing of the app’s usability will improve its overall performance.

Don’t Overlook Data Security

mHealth apps that garner personally-identifying information must meet the regulatory compliances like HIPAA. These compliances apply to both the covered entities and their business associates. Besides, the repercussions of non-compliance can result in hefty fines. So, your app developers should go through the HIPAA compliance checklist before creating your app.

Maintenance and Support

Your app development journey doesn’t end at the launch of the application but slightly extends beyond that. Maintenance, support, and scalability are the other essential factors that you should consider while planning for app development. These factors are not just about fixing bugs but also modifying the app to improve its performance and live up to user expectations. App maintenance and enhancement will also help you to match the app with the latest industry trends and stay competitive in the market.

Summing Up:

These are the essential aspects that you must know to develop a futuristic healthcare app. Following these guidelines will certainly help you to create an app that will help you to level up your business and make a statement in the healthcare market.

To create a cost-effective app and drive your business growth, approach the experts of our hybrid app development company.

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