Whenever there is a battle between the Android and iOS app development, there is always a point considered that the Android app development takes more time in comparison to the iOS app development. It may apparently seem true if you consider the fragmentation of the platform, it is not in actuality. There are a plethora of Android app development frameworks which allows you to develop mobile applications in a very short period of time.
In this article, we are going to discuss each of these frameworks in more detail.
Corona SDK:
Corona SDK was developed in 2009 and it is still amongst the topmost frameworks for developing Android mobile applications for Android TV, Smartphones, and other devices. This framework is amongst the leading cross-platform app frameworks and uses Lua for coding and empowers the developers.
Apps Builder:
Apps Builder is a popular cross-platform framework for creating apps for Android, iPhone, iPad, and HTML web apps. It is one of the easiest frameworks to use for White label apps development. However, it comes with many limitations when it has to beat the current Native apps.
Dojo Mobile:
This is a popular HTML5 framework which comes with a plethora of widgets by which you can create web-based apps for Android, iPhone, and Blackberry. These widgets are as per the top mobile applications development. These widgets can work best with Web-kit based browsers such as Google Chrome, Safari, IE10, etc. because of its CSS3 dependency.
It is a very great framework for developing lightweight apps due to its dependency only on Dojo or Dijit modules. So if you are targeting users having limited RAM phones, then you must use this framework.
Appcelerator Titanium:
This is an open-source SDK for developing android mobile applications using a single JS codebase. It is renowned for developing mobile apps which will run on multiple platforms as it lets the developers reuse nearly 60-90% of code.
As per the expert mobile application developers, a mobile app created using Titanium SDK will use particular hardware-specific features such as Android menu button, OS-centric controls like Cocoa UI controls, and even make use of notification mechanisms.
Read more: Mobile Application Test: How Does It Work?
jQuery Mobile:
This framework is highly optimized for mobile devices and tablets. It is compatible with other frameworks such as PhoneGap, Worklight, and gives you the ability to build applications for Android, iOS, Blackberry, iOS, WebOS, etc. Developers who are already well versed with jQuery will find this framework highly easy to use.
You can render platform-agnostic widgets which will automatically scale the codebase to any device screen.
PhoneGap:
PhoneGap is Adobe’s distribution of an open-source project. Apache Cordova used to develop platform-independent mobile apps. It is powered by Cordova but uses a separate command-line tool. It allows to build native mobile applications using various web development technologies such as HTML, CSS, and JS; instead of relying on platform-specific APIs like those in iOS, Android, or Windows. Developing mobile apps for each OS requires an optimum level of knowledge of different frameworks and languages, however, PhoneGap solves this issue by using standard web-based languages.
It is a flexible cross-platform framework used to build apps for all platforms including iOS and testing can be done on Windows PC for iOS apps. PhoneGap is ideal for faster app development. On-line build service is available in PhoneGap.
Xamarin:
Xamarin is one of the oldest cross-platform frameworks. It is impossible to forget Xamarin when talking about the key approaches to mobile application development. Xamarin is a tool for cross-platform mobile app development that allows the developer to share 90% of code across major platforms i.e. Android, iOS or Windows. Xamarin is an open-source framework that uses C# for native codebases for different platforms like Android and iOS. It supports Android 4.0.3+, IOS 8+, and Windows 10.
It is a near-native performance, with native user interfaces. This framework also has great community support and access to native API.
NativeScript:
NativeScript is a framework for building native iOS and Android apps using JavaScript and CSS. It renders UIs with the native platform’s rendering engine – no WebViews – resulting in native-like performance and UX. It is highly useful for building truly native mobile apps. There is native code inside your JS if you want and dare. It is cross-platform i.e. one codebase for iOS and Android. NativeScript supports Android 4.2 or a later stable official release and iOS 7.0 or later stable official release.
Ionic:
Ionic is the most preferred mobile app development framework by developers that utilizes HTML5 to develop hybrid mobile apps. The fantastic thing about Ionic is it is an open-source SDK framework that has been developed along with Angular and Apache Cordova. Ionic is only behind Angular and Node.js when it comes to popularity in the JavaScript-based programming languages or framework.
With the help of SASS, the Ionic framework provides different user interface features that help in developing interactive components. It utilizes JavaScript, CSS, and HTML, and transforms them into native code which makes the application compatible for mobile devices. It is a widely popular hybrid framework due to the fact that its UI is quite the same as Native apps.
Read more: Prototype vs MVP vs PoC (Proof of Concept): What to Choose?
Sencha Touch:
Sencha Touch has been amongst the best frameworks of 2020 because it has been a full-bodied data package. This framework can be used for developing universal mobile applications. Sencha Touch allows your web apps to look and feel like native apps. Beautiful user interface components and rich data management, all powered by the latest HTML5 and CSS3 web standards and ready for Android and Apple iOS devices. Keep them web-based or wrap them for distribution on mobile app stores.
React Native:
It has been nearly 5 years since its release and it still holds the position of most popular native app development framework. In December 2019, it was having nearly 83,200 stars on GitHub. IT giants such as React Native for their platform development. It is completely free and open-source. There is a vast community of React Native experts by Facebook, and they have provided many tutorials and solutions, so if you get stuck in any issue, you can get help easily.
The components of mobile applications just look like native ones. E.g. a button on an iOS device looks just like a native iOS button, and the same on Android. In React Native, some libraries allow you to use the same code to build iOS, Android, web, and Windows10 apps. It is very easy to learn about technology. The code is reusable for web applications and desktop app development.
Read more: Top Myths about Full Stack Application Developers & Test Questions
Wrapping Up:
Whatever a mobile app development framework you use, there is always a need for expert mobile application developers which you can find at mobile application development companies like Amplework. Let us know your app requirements.
