Smartphones are now all over the world. There was a time we all use mobile phones only as a communication medium to share important information either through call or message. But in this new era, mobile phones more than that. Let to bring your things to your house or to guide you to reach your destination or to make your payment instantly, smartphones does everything to you.   

The affordable mobile phone makes even common man use it and It raised the total mobile phone traffic to 52.2% in last year. 

You may curious to know how it does everything to go easily. It not surprising to know about mobile apps in 2020. All world paparazzi about mobile apps, we all may at least once came across it either used it or built it.   

You may see different kinds of app from gaming to education apps for  children’s, there just way of using the mobile application. 

While one side of the world is finding apps for doing their word, on another hand the developing world is finding ways to make the efficiently develop mobile apps. 

In recent years, both native and hybrid app development are quite popular. And for developers, native app vs hybrid app development becomes the most debate topic. 

Before get inside what choice for your mobile app development know completely what is mobile app development in deep to ensure yourself that you are in the right path. 

Developers are struggling in choosing whether to use native app development is good for crafting the app or hybrid app development for affordable mobile apps. 

To help them out let’s discuss here both native and hybrid app development and decide which one among them is good for app development.  

Let start by know what deep the overview of each of them. 

Native Apps  

Apps that are built using specific native tools belonging to a particular platform will fall under these categories. Since it uses every platform that has its own set of tools and programming languages these apps are more optimized and faster. The ingredients all the features provided by inbuilt smartphone OS functionalities this make the native app to deliver high performance. 

The native app comes with mesmerizing functionalities that you may expect. Whatever be the functionalities such as approval of the store instantly, rapid startup, swift performance, robust look, or consistent feel it good at all such things. 

Here are some benefits and difficulties of using Native Apps: 

Smooth Performance 

Irrespective of the type of functionalist it provides it delivers high-end graphical elements with the fact-paced performance for all users. 

This is because developers are committed to writing different codes for different operating systems with respective programming languages. And finally, the app that developed is only to the particular operating system, it works smoothly over it. When you talk about native vs hybrid app always native app wins in terms of performance.  

Built-in Components 

It effectively uses all the built-in components of smartphones. They don’t consume more energy or space for using components like a map, address book, camera, and others.  

Access Speed  

The best thing in the native app is you can effortlessly optimize the application according to the requirements of a specific platform in which is going to run. So, it helps to achieve high in both speed and performance. Another aspect developer need to consider every possible option in optimizing the app that results from an app that is perfect for the specific operating system.  

Meltdown User Experience  

In mobile app only user experience matters for the success of the application mostly. Native app in this aspect wins the race by providing a smooth and intriguing user experience. Comparing another mobile app, it provides a better feel and experience to their targeted audience. 

High Flexibility  

When it comes to user comfort-zone and flexibility native apps are best in it. Direct access to various inbuilt devices such as the GPS, camera, calendar and some other functions of the mobile make it work in users' terminology.  

Native App Disadvantages  

Cost of the Development 

You need to separately focus on each and every operating system functionality which makes developers costly in developing apps for only a project.  

It is because when you need an app for various types of platforms/operating systems, you have to get numerous developers working on them. This will surely increase your budget for the completion of the project.  

High Processing Time  

Native apps may take little extra time comparing other app development methods. As above told, to get focus on only particular technology needs a lot of time investment. 

Overview of Native App Development  

In the native mobile app development process, you need to separately create apps for iOS, Windows, Android, and Blackberry. The apps that are developed on the native platform will work only on a particular operating system.  

It is like you will create different versions of the same app for different systems with exact functionalities.  

Even if native and hybrid app differ lot but it’s end purposes remains same as offering great functionality.  

Developers will use Swift or Objective-C for developing iOS-specific applications, mostly Java will be used for Android Native applications and C# for Windows. 

Even though it creates the same functionalities process like the construction of app, design, graphic styles, typography, visual effects, data entry, etc. everything varies between the operating systems. 

It differs a lot while adding built features like access to the microphone, camera, location detection, etc. 

An Integrated Development Environment (IDE) is used to create everything for an app like version control, project management, debugging tools, and lots more. But mostly IDE remains the same for the entire platform in spite of everything being different.  

Before getting to know the difference between native app and hybrid app, understand its uniqueness in dealing problems in each situation.  

Hybrid Apps  

Hybrid apps are a cross-platform app with a 100% code reuse benefit. It is developed by expert developers who possess both web skills and technologies knowledge of developing the app. This might every developer is quite comfortable. 

You may think why it is called as cross-platform apps?  

Since these apps are partial native and partial HTML5 based web apps. They will be developed first in a native container; most of the common functionalities that are in common are developed in a native container. After it will be moved/loaded to the on a web browser. And apps will run within the internal browser of that platform if you once loaded into it. 

Its apps cover both HTML5 and native apps arenas. It like creating a web app using JavaScript and HTML5, later wrapping it within a thin native container. 

You might think where these apps are exactly stored? Hybrid apps reside on the server. 

You can store this in two ways: 

Like the native app, you can store it locally by just packing JavaScript and HTML5 together in the mobile application binary. Using REST APIs, you can move data to-and-fro between the cloud and the device.  

Otherwise, you can store on the server and implement a full web application from the server itself.  

Advantages and Disadvantages of Hybrid App 

Advantages of Hybrid Apps 

Hybrid apps are the right choice if you run on a tight budget. 

The reason behind this is you no need to hire multiple programmers to work on various OS platforms and develop multiple versions of the same app. 

Easy Maintenance

As we see overall the hybrid apps are just like web applications. So, you can easily update content modify function as much you want, and it needs very low maintenance.  

Quick productivity 

Code reusability and easy maintenance save half of the development time. So, you can take the app market as soon as possible to attract more people in advance. 

Difficulties of Hybrid Apps 

Non-engaging Performance  

It offers slightly poor performance. In Hybrid apps, an additional extra layer is placed between source code and target mobile platform to make it easy for development. But this may result in performance loss.  

Difficulty in Debugging  

Due to this extra layer, it causes big issues while debugging the application functionalities. To make it work nicely on the targeted operating system without introducing any kind of bugs in the app the developers have to rely on the framework itself for long. 

Unattractive User Experience  

Providing interactive user experience is a greater problem in hybrid app development.  

Hybrid App Development Overview  

Unlike the Native app, in the Hybrid app only one app will be created for different platforms. That is let it be iOS, Android, Windows or Blackberry, only one app is enough to serve all the purposes.  

Like said before, these apps are a combination of native apps and web apps together. So, for all the operating systems, a single product is enough to work. 

Sometimes it makes you feel and looks like a native application, but the fact is that hybrid apps are run by a website.  

The languages like CSS, HTML5, and JavaScript are used to develop these apps because of it like a web-based app that is tied inside native app shell and connected to the device’s hardware for accessing data.   

Confused about the technologies used in mobile app development don’t panic know about the best mobile app development framework to knowledge yourself. 

Let's now look at how they differ from each other based on particular features or options. 

Native vs Hybrid App Comparison  

1. User Interface  

Native Apps: It offers a rich and attractive interface of all users. 

Hybrid Apps: Due to the usage of web technology it doesn’t offer a great user interface. 

2. Platforms 

Native Apps: Provides separate app for different platforms like Android, iOS, etc. 

Hybrid Apps: The same app is used across multiple platforms over time. 

3. Performance  

Native Apps: It offers faster and highly reliable performance due to its nativity of the operating system. 

Hybrid Apps: Little slower performance. 

4. Updating  

Native Apps: Even complex server part is supported easily and you must update the full app to see changes. Also, app codes are needed to update which is done through the market. 

Hybrid Apps: Usually, it will update regularly from the app store and also no need to update the app code separately. 

5. Security  

Native Apps: Highly secured comparing hybrid apps 

Hybrid Apps: Some time attacks will easily in insecure data storage or weak implementation of SSL or even in code injection. The additional layer also leads to some problems.  

6. Navigation  

Native Apps: It makes use of built-in navigation systems to provide better performance. 

Hybrid Apps: It relay on WebView to combining existing content and present on the Web with the native app capabilities to provide easy navigation. 

7. Compatibility with other apps 

Native Apps: It is highly compatible with other apps present inside smartphones. 

Hybrid Apps: Less compatible with other apps present inside smartphones. 

8. Ecosystem  

Native Apps: It can easily connect with a rich ecosystem of tools 

Hybrid Apps: Only the developer’s ecosystem of community solutions and the third-party plugins are available. 

9. Time take the market launch  

Native Apps: It takes more time to move the app from development to market availability 

Hybrid Apps: Due to its multi-platform development, you can take the app quickly to market. 

10. Cost of Development 

Native Apps: Expensive to develop a native app even though it has a lot of advantages. 

Hybrid Apps: Budget-friendly App. 

11. Frameworks 

Native Apps: API provided by OS 

Hybrid Apps: Third-party API like Rubymotion (Ruby), React Native, PhoneGap (on HTML5, CSS, JavaScript), Sencha Touch (on HTML5, CSS, JavaScript).  

12. Required skills of Developer’s  

Native Apps: Need experience developers who are strong in developing apps on a particular OS. 

Hybrid Apps: With a common understanding of development framework and web programming languages is needed. Later developers can learn this easily.

Conclusion  

Either native or hybrid mobile application development has its own pros and cons. Both are good at simply delivering full-featured mobile apps. 

When it comes to choosing between these two development methods it better to analyses your needs carefully first. Sometimes you needed to consider another aspect like target audience, team skillsets, domain expertise, etc. 

Select the development type by leverage the requirements of your project. 

Infinijith offers the best mobile app developers for both hybrid and native development process. Connect with our experts to know which development method will suit your mobile app requirements.