{"id":10207,"date":"2020-11-17T11:07:14","date_gmt":"2020-11-17T11:07:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.arkasoftwares.com\/blog\/?p=10207"},"modified":"2026-04-14T11:00:57","modified_gmt":"2026-04-14T11:00:57","slug":"why-is-cross-platform-development-future-of-app-development","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.arkasoftwares.com\/blog\/why-is-cross-platform-development-future-of-app-development\/","title":{"rendered":"Why is Cross-Platform Development the future of Mobile App Development?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the current time, the entire world is going through major changes on different levels, and people and their businesses are witnessing a paradigm shift related to planning and strategies to meet the consumer\u2019s needs. <\/span><\/p>\n

For enterprises, the mobile application has become a perfect and strategic tool to attract and reach customers, which helps them generate more revenue.<\/span><\/p>\n

To outclass their competition, every organization is putting in more effort to develop a dedicated mobile application for themselves. <\/span><\/p>\n

Mobile platforms like Android and iOS<\/a> are getting immensely popular, and every organization is tapping into the potential of these mobile platforms to utilize the benefits of the emerging market trends and enhance the capabilities of their buyers and suppliers.<\/span><\/p>\n

The emerging mobile technologies have converted the mobile phone into a mobile application hub, which allows a common user to complete his day-to-day life, from small chores to complex banking transactions, with ease and diligence. Booking a bus ticket or airline ticket is fun now due to advantages of the online booking system<\/a>. <\/span><\/p>\n

You can easily track your food orders. <\/span><\/p>\n

On an e-commerce application of a leading electronic or FMCG company, a user can do window shopping without visiting the shop, among other things.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the traditional app development approach, the application is developed for a native platform and must be built separately because each operating system and platform use a different kind of programming language, tools, and frameworks. <\/span><\/p>\n

This hinders the flexibility of usage across different platforms, where the end-user requires a common application that could run on every kind of mobile device rather than having a separate application for a specific platform.<\/span><\/p>\n\n

\"cross<\/span><\/p>\n\n

How do you feel if we say that we do have an application development method<\/a> that uses a universal language that could be used by different devices? <\/span><\/p>\n

Now, that is what is known as cross-platform mobile application development. Cross-platform is gaining traction across the globe because it offers application development capabilities for a variety of available mobile and handheld devices on every possible mobile operating system and hardware platform. <\/span><\/p>\n

It allows developers to use tools and frameworks to develop codes for multiple platforms, and these are compatible with each other too. <\/span><\/p>\n

Today’s mobile application developers are more focused on cross-platform applications to develop a wide variety of applications. In this article, we will try to bring the best-known facts about cross-platform mobile application development, and we will also try to explain why cross-platform stands a good chance in 2021.<\/span><\/p>\n\n

<\/span>What is cross-platform app development?<\/span><\/span><\/h2>\n

In the traditional mobile application development process, the developers had to use a third-party application or programming language to develop a native application which could function on a specific kind of operating system, hardware, and mobile device. <\/span><\/p>\n

This approach had some serious disadvantages, as it tended to increase the investment cost of the application development, tend to increase the application development duration, and it also required highly skilled professionals who could have exposure to different platforms, frameworks, and programming languages.<\/span><\/p>\n

Cross-platform development comes here for the rescue, as it offers many technological solutions that eliminate most of the shortcomings of native mobile application development methodologies. It helps developers build an application that can function on different mobile platforms without any hassle.<\/span><\/p>\n

This sort of capability is achieved by developing an application using a universal programming language, that is JavaScript<\/a> <\/strong>for React Native and Dart for Flutter development. <\/span><\/p>\n

Cross-platform development helps in reducing the overall development cost, time and resources while enhancing and increasing mobile applications\u2019 effectiveness and performance.<\/span><\/p>\n\n

<\/span>Advantages of Cross-Platform App Development<\/span><\/span><\/h2>\n

Cross-platform mobile development methodology offers several advantages.<\/span><\/p>\n

Reduce app development cost<\/h3>\n

Cross-platform offers flexibility where we do not need to develop applications in multiple languages. Apart from that software testing and debugging becomes very easy, as bugs identified in the common code base need to be tested and fixed at once. <\/span><\/p>\n

Hence, it helps us reduce the cost, effort, and time invested in application development, which in turn reduces the cost to a great extent.<\/span><\/p>\n

Single codebase\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

This approach allows us to write a single and universal code, which essentially covers different frameworks, mobile operating systems at once. <\/span><\/p>\n

Single codebase influences and enhances all the stages of mobile app development, as it allows us to code less and invest fewer resources for debugging and fixing only a single code, instead of working on separate codes.<\/span><\/p>\n

Reduction in time to market\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

Time to market is an extremely important metric for application development. Cross-platform allows developers to develop a universal application for multiple platforms, instead of developing 2-3 separate applications for each device platform.<\/span><\/p>\n

It ensures we can release our application in the market at a rapid pace.<\/span><\/p>\n

Uniformity across different platforms<\/span><\/h3>\n

Cross-platform enhances uniformity across different operating systems and offer a seamless user experience.<\/span><\/p>\n

Reachability to more customers and better ROI\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

Cross-platform applications help Organizations to reach and engage more customers and it in turn increases the user experience and future Return on Investment.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tool familiarity\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

The Cross-platform application development tools are quite familiar for developers, as they employ commonly used programming languages. These languages and tools are easy to learn and use.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ideal for prototyping\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

Cross-platform mobile application development is ideal for developing application prototypes, as it allows a rapid time to market on multiple platforms. <\/span><\/p>\n

It also offers an opportunity to interact with the customers, take their feedback, create a niche in the market, and secure the patents before any competitor can capture that opportunity. <\/span><\/p>\n

Hence, it gives a much-needed tactical and strategical push to the mobile application owner.<\/span><\/p>\n

Enterprise-wide deployment and adoption\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

Cross-platform gives a big advantage to the Enterprises if they want to deploy the applications for usage by their employees. <\/span><\/p>\n

Cross-platform can help you deploy the application at an unbelievable pace and it also helps to adopt the applications at a much lower cost, since BYOD (bring your own device) policies are becoming a new norm at the workplace.<\/span><\/p>\n\n

\"byjus<\/a><\/p>\n\n

<\/span>Challenges with Cross-Platform Mobile App Development<\/span><\/span><\/h2>\n

There are some disadvantages to using cross-platform development:<\/span><\/p>\n

Impact of efficiency\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

It has observed that Programs developed via a Cross-platform methodology could be less efficient. This generally occurs due to a lack of enough hardware resources to execute flawless HTML5 animations on low-mid range mobile devices.<\/span><\/p>\n

Overgeneralization of Code\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

While developing the cross-platform application, we have to ensure that it should be more generalized, as it has to use the common workflows on different OS and Platforms. But the irony is, in this process, the application code becomes less sophisticated, which may cause several functionalities and compatibilities issues later.<\/span><\/p>\n

High Battery consumption\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

Such applications generally use advanced features, which obviously use more hardware and system resources of the mobile phone, which in turn led to massive battery consumption.<\/span><\/p>\n

Cross-platform applications generally consume more hardware, system resources, and battery power, if we compare it with native applications.<\/span><\/p>\n

Cores of Cross-Platform App Development<\/span><\/h3>\n

Three important cores of cross-platform mobile app development tools are CSS3, HTML, and JavaScript. The beneficial feature of these tools is cost-effectiveness and easy implementation. <\/span><\/p>\n

Every tool has advantages and disadvantages. If we compare to the native languages their cross-platform ability pushes their demand in the market.<\/span><\/p>\n\n

<\/span>Top Tools and Frameworks<\/span><\/span><\/h2>\n

With the growing number of mobile devices and mobile platforms, the market has been fragmented up to a great extent. The cross-platform applications allow developers to write the code once and then deploy on multiple devices and platforms. <\/span><\/p>\n

.However, the huge number of available tools for cross-platform development has created a lot of difficulties for the developers to choose the right tool.<\/span><\/p>\n

Though there are already few leaders in the market, who have created a niche market for themselves and could be used without any second thought. It is important to understand the frameworks and their functions for Cross-Platform Mobile Applications to ensure the maximum output of your venture. <\/span><\/p>\n

Please find below the list of top cross-platform mobile app development platforms and tools, that allow for rapid software development and deployment:<\/span><\/p>\n

1. React Native\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n\n

\"react<\/span><\/p>\n\n

It is an open-source, cross-platform app development tool and it was developed by Facebook. It is based on a methodology called \u201clearn once, write everywhere<\/strong>\u201d. <\/span><\/p>\n

Its base language is JavaScript which offers compatibility with native functions. <\/span><\/p>\n

Developers can port the same code of the applications for both Android and iOS platforms. <\/span>
\nThe function that helps React Native to stand apart is, that the applications which are built on React Native have the same look and feel as a native application, but it gives an enhanced interactive user interface. <\/span><\/p>\n

It is an emerging framework that offers prompt prototyping and high deliverability.<\/span><\/p>\n\n

Read Also:- Angular vs React – Best JavaScript Development Framework?<\/a><\/h4>\n\n

2. Native Script\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

It offers a seamless ability to write the code as similar to writing native applications with cross-platform capability in JavaScript, typescript, or Angular. <\/span><\/p>\n

It has become an immensely popular application development framework, which helps us to develop highly effective and efficient micro Applications. <\/span><\/p>\n

Micro applications are more capable to perform actions with precision and accuracy as generally, it focuses on a single feature.<\/span>
\nNative Script has the following major parts.<\/span><\/p>\n