Mobile app development has evolved in recent years. One approach that appears to have gained significant traction recently is using a simple native webview to top off a PWA web app to deliver a lightweight native mobile experience. It works, and it works great!
Given how the general opinion in the developer community has been riveted in favor of apps written in native code (using system api calls), this shift in the overall worldview of the community is nothing less than stellar.
It is stellar for the web, at least. The web has genuinely advanced a lot in the past five to ten years. It has matured to a point where the four pillars of web development—HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and WebAssembly—are likely enough for universal distribution.
But aside from being stellar and a massive cultural change, it is also economical. The hard truth is that the cost of developing and maintaining three apps (web, Android, and iOS) for the same business logic is a lot. Sooner or later, it will pinch in the hind and compound that with the fact that slowness/bloatware will eventually creepas your app ages; this is not a very scalable path. Some teams may argue they work hard to keep bloatware in check, but then it'd be three times as expensive on three pipelines instead of one. With a webview, your website (web apps and not static sites, mind you) is going to become the gold standard of all experiences.
This means you can focus all your effort, time, and money on building a kickass, performant web app with a native-level mobile experience. An experience that equals or leads the native land by miles is possible and recommended to everyone in 2024 and beyond.
If you observe the web of the last few years, most torchbearer apps are from the web. Figma comes to mind. Fastmail is another. Starbucks too, which is such a stellar webview PWA app!
Aside from the numerous possibilities the web offers, tapping into native modules where it is essential (like with Apple Pay or in-app purchases.) makes a native webview a compelling choice for developers on any side of the aisle. Of course, you want to keep such digressions into the native land at a minimum.
An embedded web view is a powerful beast to harness and surprise the world with your web app. Below, we reiterate some of the main reasons webview mobile apps are better than anything else on the market.
Cross-Platform Compatibility
One of the most significant advantages of using native webview is cross-platform compatibility. These apps are web applications wrapped in a native shell, meaning a single universal app can be served on all platforms, including the iOS and Android app stores.
Benefits include eliminating the need to develop and maintain separate codebases for each platform and reducing development time and costs.
Faster Development and Easy Updates
Webview mobile apps are faster to develop and turn around for deployment. With native apps, you often need platform-specific expertise and a separate codebase for each platform.
In contrast, a webview app will leverage simpler web technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, which are well-known and have a large pool of developers. Updates and bug fixes can be pushed out to all users simultaneously without waiting for app store approvals, resulting in a more agile development process.
Lower Maintenance Effort
Native apps often require system-specific or version-specific hacks to maintain compatibility with new OS versions, devices, and screen sizes. In contrast, a webview mobile app can meet any platform's compatibility requirements since it adopts web standards that have been finalized and stabilized over the years.
Standardization leads to a happier end user, and such apps do not require perpetual feature handling since the ideals are usually set in stone.
Easier Debugging
Debugging webview-based apps is generally easier than native apps. Developers can use familiar web debugging tools like Chrome Developer Tools, which offer features for inspecting and debugging the app's code.
Developer happiness!
Improved Performance
As mentioned before, the web has come a long way, and it can offer impressive performance and interactivity to the end user. Render views efficiently with state management, take advantage of hardware acceleration for buttery animations, serve HTTP requests with vendor multiplexing, or cache and implement an offline-first app—it's a blast!
Drop down below to webassembly, serve bytecode for memory-heavy transactions wrapped within your webview mobile app and website.
Cost-Efficiency
Web and webview mobile apps are cost-efficient for businesses. It is at least 66% cheaper to reduce from three pipelines to one, naively speaking. Additionally, webview mobile apps benefit from lower distribution costs since they don't need to go through the app store approval process now and then.
This can result in significant cost savings over time.
Easy A/B Testing
Webview-based apps make it easier to perform A/B testing and gather user data for analysis. Developers can make changes to the web content and instantly test them with a subset of users. This allows for data-driven decision-making and the ability to refine the app based on user behavior and preferences.
Conclusion
While native may still be useful in certain limited situations, an embedded web view as a mobile app offers a range of compelling and operational advantages that make it better for everyone else—i.e., the rest of us.
You can easily convert your web app into a (webview) mobile app using Red Goose. This is what we do every day!
Don't waste a second or a penny more than what is enough for your business. I mean, is there another reason Apple is moving toward embedded webviews for their apps and the operating system too?