Imagine your application running flawlessly on customer devices, regardless of whether they use iOS or Android, Smartphones, Desktops, or tablets, without requiring separate development efforts for any platform!
This imagination can be a reality for your business mobile app. You can offer a seamless and lasting user experience on whichever device your target audience uses for your app. This is the power of Cross-platform app development.
What fuels this power is a Cross-platform app development framework. When you hire cross-platform app developers, they either ask about your preference or suggest specific frameworks for your project.
Among many cross-platform frameworks, we have curated top cross-platform app development frameworks in this post. We will look at every framework separately so you can check their feasibility for your project. So, before hiring mobile app developers, know how to minimize the budget and effort, accelerating your app’s time-to-market.
Before we look up the Top 9 Cross-Platform Framework for app development, let us understand the benefits of cross-platform app development.
Benefits you can reap with Cross-Platform App Development Frameworks
Reach a wider audience:
With cross-platform app development frameworks, businesses can target users on multiple platforms, such as iOS, Android, and Windows, expanding their potential customer base and increasing their reach.
Cost-effective development:
By utilizing a shared codebase across different platforms, businesses can save valuable development time and reduce costs, as they don’t need to build separate apps for each platform.
Faster deployment:
Cross-platform frameworks enable businesses to release updates and new features simultaneously across all platforms, ensuring a faster time-to-market and keeping up with customer demands.
Consistent user experience:
With cross-platform development, businesses can maintain a consistent look and feel across different platforms, providing a seamless and familiar experience to users, regardless of the device they’re using.
Simplified maintenance:
Making updates and fixing bugs becomes easier with cross-platform app development frameworks, as businesses can implement changes in one central codebase, minimizing the effort required for maintenance.
Increased productivity:
Developing an app once and deploying it across multiple platforms boosts developer productivity, as they can focus on a single codebase instead of working on separate codebases for different platforms.
Smooth integration:
Cross-platform frameworks offer seamless integration with existing backend systems and APIs, enabling businesses to integrate their apps with other services and ensure smooth operations.
Enhanced user engagement:
Leveraging device-specific features and capabilities, businesses can provide tailored and native-like experiences to users on different platforms, improving user engagement and satisfaction.
Simplified testing:
With a single codebase, businesses can perform comprehensive testing, reducing the complexities associated with testing on multiple platforms and ensuring a high-quality app.
Future-proofing:
Cross-platform development allows businesses to adapt to emerging platforms and technologies more efficiently, ensuring their app remains relevant and functional as new platforms and devices enter the market.
Now let us focus on the top Cross-platform app development frameworks with their pros and cons.
Top 9 Cross-platform App Development Frameworks
1. Flutter
Flutter has quickly gained popularity among developers as one of the most promising cross-platform app development frameworks. This Google-backed open-source framework allows you to build natively compiled applications for the web, Desktop, Fuchsia, macOS, iOS, and Android using Dart programming language.
Its rich set of widgets, modern UI components, and excellent performance make Flutter app development the ultimate solution for businesses. Flutter characteristics prevail over traditional cross-platform app development tools like Xamarin and React Native.
Pros:
- Fast app development
- Easy-to-use UI
- Provides widgets and libraries
- Responsive
- Clear documentation
Cons:
- No flexibility
- Limited libraries
2. React Native
We can’t forget this famous framework called React Native as far as cross-platform app development is concerned. Like Appcelerator, it also supports the JavaScript codebase, making it a good choice. Also, React Native can be used to write codes that give a native-like feel to a mobile application that can work on both Android and iOS.
It comes equipped with a number of features and practical usability offered by React Native. And hence, it becomes a better option than many other frameworks available out there.
Pros:
- JavaScript for fast programming
- Allows codebase sharing
- Good performance
Cons:
- Not entirely usable for cross-platform development
- Compatibility issues
- Requires expertise in the case of native modules
Apps built with React Native cross-platform app development framework
- Bloomberg
- Netflix
3. NativeScript
NativeScript is also one of the most preferred Cross-platform App Development Tools used for both iOS and Android. It allows a mobile app developer to develop native apps with the use of TypeScript, Angular, JavaScript, or Vue.js. Moreover, this open-source framework offers to customize the User interface as per various screen types on different mobiles or other devices. Apart from that, there is hardly any need for third-party solutions.
Pros:
- Good overall performance
- Allows architectural selection among Angular, TypeScript, JavaScript, and Vue
- Big repository when it comes to plug-ins
Cons:
- No live sync
- Almost everything is running on a single thread
Apps built with NativeScript Cross-platform framework
- Wordiator
- FanFiktion.de
- Aura CO2
4. Ionic
This framework stands out in the crowd due to the option of offering a combination of many languages to users. Developers can use this framework to build a user-friendly app interface and user-friendly features. What makes it a good choice is it is an open-source front-end framework.
This allows the developers to alter the development process according to their own unique ideas. Ionic is based on SAAS UI, which is the best framework due to being designed specifically for mobile operating systems.
Pros:
- Easy to learn
- Concise documentation
- Fast prototyping
- Single codebase across different platforms
Cons:
- Lacks in overall performance
- Security-related issues
- Plugin-dependent
Apps built with Ionic Cross-platform framework
- MarketWatch
- Sworkit
- JustWatch
5. Xamarin
Xamarin is a totally different app development framework from the ones we have discussed so far. By using Xamarin, the developer can use 90% of the code for building all three different platforms. Xamarin is used to develop applications for Android, iOS, and Windows.
In terms of the base language, Xamarin uses C#, and for those who don’t know, C# offers a better product than other existing languages. Also, Xamarin has an advantage over React Native, that is, a native-like aesthetic experience it gives to your app.
Pros:
- The performance level is close to Native
- Easy to maintain
- Requires only one stack of technologies for different platforms
Cons:
- Access to Open Source Libraries is limited
- Higher cost factor
6. PhoneGap
PhoneGap is one of the best cross-platform app development tools offering language support like JavaScript, HTML5, and CSS. This is known to have changed the field mobile development field considerably. PhoneGap is a good choice if you are looking for cross-platform mobile application development.
Apart from developing apps for all major platforms, you can also add features in add-ons. Moreover, what makes PhoneGap different is the option to work without any hardware restrictions.
Pros:
- Fast Testing
- Fast Deployment
- One Code Base when it comes to various platforms
Cons:
- Performance isn’t good as the other on the list
- Lacking UI widgets
Apps built with PhoneGap Cross-platform framework
- HealthTap
- TripCase
7. Kotlin Multiplatform
Kotlin multiplatform is another great cross-platform framework. It allows you to write shared code in Kotlin that can be used to build apps for iOS, Android, Web, and Desktop. In addition to code, it lets developers share business logic, data models, and utility functions between platforms.
Besides such extensive shareability, you can still write platform-specific code with Kotlin Multiplatform. Above all, the framework offers interpretability with native APIs, libraries, to access native features, leveraging existing resources.
Pros:
- Syntax similar to Swift and Java
- Single codebase for Business Logic
- Utilize Native UI elements to its fullest
- Good choice for MVP
Cons:
- It’s still in beta version
- Limited community
- Require more development resources
8. Sencha Touch
Sencha Touch is a famous cross-platform mobile application development framework like all other names in this list. It is known to have built-in native-looking themes for all major platforms like Android, iOS, and others. It is known to provide results in the form of fast and efficient applications.
Applications developed in Sencha Touch are known for speedy hardware acceleration techniques. With Sencha Touch, even developing and maintaining larger business apps is also possible. Sencha Touch is also known to have Cordova integration inbuilt.
Pros:
- Community support
- Fast performance
- Good documentation
- Easy to use with plug-ins
Cons:
- Heavy DOM elements
9. Corona SDK
Corona SDK works in a way that is similar to that of the Flutter framework, which is also discussed in the list. When it comes to developing cross-platform 2D games, Corona SDK is a good choice. This framework is used by programmers for the development of apps on all major platforms. Moreover, this framework is reliable because of the fact that it offers a backend framework language, Lua.
Lua is a comparatively lightweight application development language. Corona SDK focuses on only the major aspects of all development, such as portability, extensibility, scalability, and ease of use.
Pros:
- You only require writing the code once
- Minimum lag
- A good amount of plug-ins
- Easy to both use and learn
Cons:
- Quite costly to use
- No way at present to integrate native plug-ins
Apps built with Corona SDK
- Designer City
- Fun Run 2
Conclusion
You have the top cross-platform app development frameworks to choose from. However, which one will suit the best for your project is not easy to evaluate. You cannot risk choosing the wrong framework. It can do more harm than good to your budget, time, effort, and business.
That doesn’t mean you should abandon cross-platform development altogether. You must seek guidance from an experienced cross-platform app development company or developers. Since they would have developed cross-platform apps, it becomes easy to suggest which framework will work out for your unique project requirements.
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