Top Seven Cross-Platform App Development Frameworks

Mobile apps are projected to have the most impact on business in 2020. Native mobile app development for iOS and Android is resource- and time-consuming, and therefore difficult to maintain in today’s competitive market. The best solution to reduce the time and cost of app development is cross-platform development.

Based on the Stack Overflow 2019 Developer Survey, the top seven cross-platform mobile app development frameworks are:

React Native

Created by Facebook, this open-source mobile application framework is built on JavaScript. It combines the best parts of native development with React.js. It is used by Facebook, Airbnb, Uber, Tesla, Walmart and other global giants for mobile applications.

Key Features

• Write once, use everywhere – written in JavaScript and rendered with native code.
• UI focused on React’s declarative paradigm and JS.
• Highly responsive with the best rendering abilities.
• Strongest community presence in the cross-platform mobile app development space.
• Significantly short development time.
• Support for third-party libraries.

Flutter

Flutter is Google’s UI toolkit for building attractive, natively-compiled applications for mobile, web, and desktop from a single codebase.

Key Features

• Fast development with fully customizable widgets.
• Highly customized user experience.
• Modern react-style framework.
• Expressive and flexible UI with layered architecture for full customization.
• Full native performance and features on both iOS and Android.
• Development capabilities on Linux, Mac, and Windows.

Ionic

Free and open-source, Ionic offers a library of mobile-optimized UI components, gestures, and tools for building highly interactive apps.

Key Features

• Adaptive styling for apps that look and feel at home on every platform and device.
• Developer-friendly Ionic CLI (Command Line Interface) to create, test and deploy your app.
• Simple and easy to learn.
• Cross-platform – write once, run anywhere.
• AngularJS MVC architecture for single page applications, optimized for mobile devices.

Xamarin

Xamarin is free, cross-platform, and open-source available for building Android and iOS apps with .NET and C#. Owned by Microsoft, Xamarin works on the WORA model to deliver stunning cross-platform UI.

Key Features

• Single stack for faster development.
• Faster time to market.
• Flexible architecture.
• Strong development community. 
• Shareable code for write once run anywhere with ease.

Adobe PhoneGap

Previously known as Apache Cordova, the PhoneGap framework is a free and open-source platform that targets multiple platforms with one codebase.

Key Features

• Reusable code across platforms.
• Accesses native device APIs.
• Framework devoid of any hardware restriction.
• Possible to wrap a web application into a native container.
• Rapid app development.
• Reliable framework for mobile app development.

Native Scripts

An open-source framework for building truly native mobile apps with Angular, Vue.js, TypeScript, or JavaScript. Most developers love Native Scripts for its powerful web empowerment platform.

Key Features

• Native performance – attractive, accessible, platform-native UI without web views.
• Extensible – efficient 100% access to all iOS and Android APIs.
• Cross-platform – write and deploy native iOS and Android mobile apps from a single code.
• Strong backing of mission-critical enterprise support.
• Free and open–source.

Corona SDK

Arguably the fastest cross-platform mobile app development framework, Corona is ten times faster than coding from scratch. Corona is powered by a ‘Lua’ based framework – the lightweight open-source scripting language that offers speed, ease-of-use, and flexibility to develop apps fast. Being the fastest, Corona is ideal for rapid creation of apps and games for mobile platforms.

Key Features

• Single codebase.
• Plugins for all needs.
• Dominant APIs.
• Cross-platform.
• Optimized for fast performance – apps are automatically compiled at build time, streamlined for performance and stability.
• Strong and active community support.

Choosing the right platform for your app matters now more than ever. As a strategic technology partner, Analytix helps build efficiency, speed, and reliability into your app development. We combine design with technologies, and transform powerful business-linked web apps using modern, multi-platform frameworks.

Next Steps:

• Visit Analytix IT to learn more about our solutions for mobile application development.
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