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Let's compare the best cross-platform app frameworks (React Native, Ionic, Cordova, PhoneGap) to develop for iOS and Android at the same time.

Comparing Ionic vs Cordova vs PhoneGap vs React Native

I set out to build an app for myself called 

 (it’s the insider’s guide to the city).

I looked into the cross-platform frameworks available so I could build it for both iOS 

 — Apps created with these frameworks are basically websites created with HTML, CSS, & Javascript, smushed into app form. It 

 like an app. When you interact with the app, it feels slightly sluggish and not responsive.

 — This framework take an entirely different approach to hybrid cross-platform apps, and uses native UI elements, powered by Javascript. You write your app in Javascript, then 

 works some magic and turns the user interface into 

. This means that when you touch & feel your app, it 

React Native apps are snappy, responsive, and a joy to use.

. I argue that it takes less than half the time to build an app compared to full native apps, because not only do you have to build an app once instead of twice, it’s just faster to build the first app period.

Under the hood, React Native uses Javascript to run the business logic, for example handling a button click or fetching data from a server.

Technically it does this with a headless browser. Because of this if you don’t program the app right, you may see some slowness.

There are ways in which to program the app however that eliminate this problem and the user will never know the difference between a pure native app and a React Native app.

Companies including Instagram, Facebook (parts of their app), Bloomberg, & Skype (

From a technical perspective, it wins some points because it uses technology many developers already know: Javascript and React. Web developers don’t have to learn an entirely new language (Objective C, Swift, or Java); they just apply the skills they already have to a new form factor, mobile.

So how did the app come out? Speakeasy is snappy, responsive, and I bet you couldn’t tell it’s a React Native app.

React Native strikes the perfect balance in creating cross-platform apps because it’s super fast to build them and the apps look 

 feel like native mobile apps. The end result is a polished, snappy and responsive mobile app.

You write the apps in Javascript, which is one of the most popular programming languages and use the React framework which is a revolutionary and brilliant framework.

React Native isn’t great for games or anything with complex animations. But for most apps that simply display and let you edit data, it’s a great choice.

React Native is a great choice for 80% of the apps out there.

I envisioned a mobile app development company that takes a radically different approach to building apps.

How We Create Beautiful Mobile Apps in Half the Time

Here’s the story of why I created Foxbox Digital, a different kind of mobile app development company.

 we needed to build a mobile app to complement our existing web app. We were a team of web developers and didn’t have experience building iOS or Android apps. We reached out to some local app development companies in Chicago to get quotes on what it would take to build the app. The quotes were really high, and that was for 

. And after that, we’d need to have them build the Android app too.

We’re responsible for hosting and supporting the API that actually runs the app. We ended up finding a freelance iOS developer to build the app, and he did a killer job. It cost a ton of money though, and at the end of the day we could only support half our users because the other half were on Android.

 I understand why mobile app development companies charge so much for a mobile app — developers are expensive, and in-demand. But isn’t there a better way?

, Ionic, and Cordova. Ionic and Cordova apps look like native mobile apps, but they don’t feel like them — they’re slow and sluggish. React Native strikes the perfect balance because they’re fast to build, and the apps look and feel like native mobile apps (snappy and responsive). And it’s simply a joy to program the code. 

With a cross-platform framework like React Native, we build both the iOS app and the Android app at the same time. 

This cuts the development time (and cost) in half

Through our engagement with Home Chef, we developed and published both iOS and Android apps using React Native.

This helped them significantly increase app store ratings, meal kit conversions, and user engagement rates. 

The mobile app is only part of the solution though — every mobile app needs an API to power the app. An API is the server and software that the app communicates with in order to do what it needs to do (i.e. get and store data). Once you have an API built, you need to host and maintain it. As a client, do you want to be bothered to maintain an API?

I thought about all of the things that you need to do in order to keep your app up and running in the app stores.

Mobile App — build it, launch it, maintain it (fix bugs and security issues).

API — build it, build servers to host it, maintain it.

Monitor the API to ensure it stays running and respond to issues as they come up.

Upgrade the mobile app every time Apple or Google releases a new phone or operating system. Re-release to both app stores.

Do clients really want to do all of this?

 We’d use reusable building blocks to create the core of the app, and a finely tuned process to develop them. With this approach, it’s much easier to predict how long it will take to build the app.

 that handles everything from design to building clients’ apps to keeping them up & running, for the life of the apps. We’d be a trusted partner to our clients, so they wouldn’t have to worry about anything involved in building or running their mobile apps.

Foxbox Digital creates beautiful cross-platform mobile apps  in half the time. We handle everything involved in running and maintaining your app, for the life of the app.

 and let's come up with a strategy to build it.

Inside the Box

Articles, updates, and ideas you can put to use.

Comparing Ionic vs Cordova vs PhoneGap vs React Native

How We Create Beautiful Mobile Apps in Half the Time