Native and Hybrid Mobile App Development Pros and Cons and 7 Important Mobile App Development Trends in 2021

In this blog article, we will discuss what’s the new and happening in the games and mobile/web application software development. and the 7 important trends and tactics you should be cognizant of as we approach 2021.  Each year due to advances in software development tools and technologies its important to research and applying these best practices, mobile games, and mobile apps software development processes, best practices, and technologies for our clients.   For entrepreneurs, new and existing startups, business owners both large and small its super-important to keep up with them. By knowing how technology is progressing, you can stay well ahead of your competition and give them a run for their money in all industries and verticals.

Regardless of the industry, your business is operating in, you need to make the right impression in order to convert prospects into clients or customers. By being aligned with new mobile and web development trends, you know where they stand and how you can fulfill their requirements better. In short, you’re able to serve them better and in a more profound manner.

Similarly, even today’s developers always need to keep themselves updated. Because the fast-growing mobile and web app development industry highly favors those who can reinvent themselves. Every new trend that comes along brings a new opportunity for growth, something that needs to be understood by both business and developers, alike.

With a wave of fresh and useful innovations, it’s no surprise that the year 2020 is brimming with new mobile and web app development trends. Trends that are waiting for you to tap into. The idea here is to gain quick and clear insight into the latest trends so that you can take full advantage of them in the best possible way.

Let’s investigate some of the latest mobile and web app development trends that are bound to grow in 2019 and beyond.

#1: Artificial Intelligence (AI)

Artificial intelligence or AI is the new buzzword. It’s a technology to reckon with. And why not? AI has been gaining a lot of ground lately as it allows machines to mimic human intelligence and behavior. Yes, it lets machines perform various cognitive functions including:

• Learning new information
• Collecting specific and crucial data
• Analyzing different types of information
• Understanding human emotions
• Finding solutions to difficult problems
• AI will increasingly be monitoring and refining business processes
• More and more personalization will take place in real-time
• AI will become more useful as data becomes more accurate and available
• More devices will run AI-powered technology
• You will see more Human and AI cooperation increase
• You will see AI increasingly used to create films, music, and games
• AI will become ever more present in cybersecurity
• AI solutions will recognize us, even if we don’t recognize it
• More of us will interact with AI, maybe without even knowing it

As we move into 2021, AI will not only help in multi-task automation but will also humanize workforce communications. If you look around, you’ll find that AI-powered chatbots are already helping companies enhance customer engagement. They’re improving and transforming social interaction in a big way.

However, it’s worth noting that so far in 2020, AI and Machine Learning have gone well beyond chatbots. Because let’s face it, even though these technologies are in a nascent stage, they are already helping businesses in two major ways:

• Increasing immediate profitability
• Decreasing operational expenses
• Analyzing different types of information
• Understanding human emotions
• Finding solutions to difficult problems

According to a study conducted by IDC, more than 80 percent of workers using ERP solutions will now be leveraging Artificial Intelligence to expand and improve their proficiency at the workplace.

Spending on research, development, and deployment continues to rise, and debate over the wider social implications rages on. Meanwhile, the incentives only get bigger for those looking to roll out AI-driven innovation into new areas of industry, fields of science, and our day-to-day lives. This just goes on to show that AI and Machine Learning are here to stay, and organizations using them smartly will be in a better and stronger competitive position.

#2: Internet of Things (IoT)

The Internet of Things is experiencing rapid growth and there’s no stopping to it in 2020. Every mobile app developer knows how big of a mobile app development trend it is. Look around you, and you’ll find many major industries tapping into the power of IoT. It is making an impact in industry verticals such as e-commerce, healthcare, transportation, and even construction.

So, what exactly is the Internet of Things?

The IoT is a network of Internet-connected physical objects, embedded with various types of sensors that help collect and exchange DATA. These objects could be as complex as a vehicle or as simple as a coffee machine.

Here are some stats that prove the significance of IoT in the coming future and the kind of impact it will have:

• The global IoT market is growing at a CAGR of 28.5% for the past few years and is expected to reach USD 487 billion in 2020.
• IoT investment is expected to touch $150 billion by 2021 and have a strong economic impact of up to $11.5 trillion by 2025.
• Globally, the number of installed IoT devices are forecasted to grow to a whopping 50.1 billion in number by 2020

There are two sectors that will gain immensely from the Internet of Things: education and healthcare. IoT will be used in educational institutions to connect and bring teachers, students and parents together like never. It will allow them to stay connected with the help of a virtual device and learn about the happenings not only in the class but also around the whole campus. What’s more, parents can get access to real-time data related to the performance of their child in the class.

Coming to healthcare, you can find that the sector is already taking advantage of IoT. With the birth of the Medical Internet of Things, doctors and patients can jump on the same page more easily. Thanks to IoT, doctors can now access highly accurate data about the patient’s health condition and offer them the most relevant treatment.

All in all, the IoT is one of the most impactful technologies of our time. A growing technology that is only going to get more powerful with time.

#3: Voice Search Optimization (VSO)

With the growing popularity of digital assistants such as Cortana, Alexa, and Google Now, voice search is bound to grow further. These smart, personal assistants have literally changed how we get hold of critical, timely information. Which clearly points towards the importance of voice search data and its potential use.

Voice search and voice optimization are two trends in the web development world that are only going to go upwards in 2019.

Why? Because gathering strong insight on targeted user behaviors/intents becomes a whole lot easier with voice search data. Also, understanding and decoding the precise needs of users becomes approachable and real.

Given below are some eye-opening stats that clearly show us the importance of voice search optimization:

• As of today, around 20 percent of mobile searches happen to be voice searches.
• By 2020, at least 50 percent of search queries will be voice-based, not text-based.
• 46% of US adults say they have used voice search on their smartphones
• Voice commerce sales may reach up to about $5 billion in the UK and $40 billion in the US by 2022.

So, only focusing on traditional SEO may just not work for a business. You also need to optimize for voice search to achieve higher results. Effective voice search engine optimization involves optimizing for spoken search queries. The focus should be on how the search user talks rather than types.

For example, when searching for an affordable dentist, you might search for something like ‘cheap gym near me’. However, when using voice search, your query turns into a question phrase, such as ‘which is the cheapest gym near my place?’. As you can see, optimizing for voice search will go a long way.

#4: Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality (AR & VR)

Augmented Reality or AR is changing the gaming industry by helping app developers’ experiment. One of the most well-known examples of AR mobile apps is Pokémon Go, a game that was downloaded almost 800 million times and generated a whopping revenue of $1.2 billion. So, it’s safe to say that AR has clearly revolutionized app development in the gaming/entertainment space in a major way and it will continue to do so. But is it only about that? Or there is more?

The fact of the matter is, AR as technology is growing with leaps and bounds. And no, it is not limited to one industry. In 2019, AR will be making an impact in many fields, including but not limited to:

• Real Estate
• Architecture
• Health
• Retail

For example, architects can use AR to explain new designs to clients much more easily. The client can get a clear idea of a building’s scale by standing inside it. They may look up to understand the real height of the ceiling or see sideways to perceive the width of the room. The architect can go a step further and even add some furniture with the help of AR for the client to walk around. In short, it’s an experience like no other.

Just like AR, virtual reality is also a mobile app development trend that will gain prominence in the year 2019. VR’s potential hasn’t been explored fully and there is a long way to go in terms of using it creatively. VR is not just limited to helping medical students get inside in the human body using a simulation. No, VR is being tapped into by various businesses that want to get their product in the hands of customers before it’s built. And give them a feel of it in real-time without investing in it.

For example, an e-commerce site selling spectacles can have its customers try on various specs before selecting one. Similarly, everything from jewelry to dresses can be virtually tried on by customers using VR before they pull out their credit cards.

In a world where more and more people are making online purchases, the importance of giving them a “taste” of the product only increases. And businesses aren’t afraid to invest in developing their own VR mobile apps to help their customers have a better buying experience.

You could say that VR is quickly moving to the web browser. Just look at WebVR, an open specification that is helping people experience VR right in the browser – without the traditional VR headset.

#5: Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMPs)

When it comes to web app development trends, the importance of accelerated mobile pages or AMPs cannot be ignored in 2021. Because AMPs’ sole purpose is to help web pages load quicker on mobile devices. And for businesses that don’t want to lose customers and grow, even a few seconds of delay in mobile site load time can make the visitor leave.

According to Google, a 2-second additional delay in page load time is enough to increase the bounce rate by 32 percent. And when the page load time goes from 1 second to 5 seconds, it can send the bounce rate through the roof – up to 90 percent.

AMPs technology basically allows you to focus on two important elements:

• Speed
• Readability

Since the goal of AMPs (Google’s open-source project) is to help developers produce fast-loading mobile pages, the use of HTML and CSS is naturally limited. Call it the bare-bones version of HTML. AMPs are not a passing web development trend, because it continues to grow stronger year after year.

#6: Progressive Web Apps (PWAs)

More and more people are spending their time on mobile apps. In fact, according to Smart Insights, people spend close to 90 percent of their mobile usage time on mobile apps. So, it’s only natural for businesses to cater to the needs of their audience.

Inline to the growing demand of mobile apps is a new, fast-growing web application development trend in 2019: Progressive Web Apps or PWAs. A PWA is nothing but a web-based application that acts and works like a full-blown mobile app. So, unlike a regular web app, people can use it offline and reap the benefits like a mobile app, which include:

• Offline support
• Data security
• Push notifications
• Immersive user-experience
• Faster loading pages

#7: Importance of Mobile Apps-Native Mobile App Development compared to Hybrid Mobile App Development

With the recent pandemic, we have seen the age of mobility become even more important in our day to day lives. More people are at home, and spending more time on mobile games and mobile apps. As entrepreneurs, businesses look at their future mobile apps, and mobile games will play a significant part in how we ill stay entertained, conduct business, order food, prescription, medicine, cars etc.atural for businesses to cater to the needs of their audience.

Advantages of Native Mobile Application Development

• Better performance
• Native Apps live on the device and are accessed through icons on the device home screen.
• Native Apps can take full advantage of all the device features − they can use the camera, the GPS, the accelerometer, the compass, the list of contacts, and so on. They can also incorporate gestures (either standard operating-system gestures or new, and app-defined gestures).
• Native apps can use the device’s notification system and can work offline.
• Data Protection- It much easier to make the native application secure-most business are very interested in this aspect
• Overall Functionality
• Native Apps maintain UI design of each operating system, thus they offer the best user experience. For example, a Native App can have a left-aligned header in Android and a center-aligned header in iOS.
• Customer Experience-customers will definitely see the higher performance, they can work in offline mode-currently this is still an issue for hybrid apps.
• Comprehension form a development perspective, developers are already aware of all the strengths and weaknesses of the native app development technologies.
• It has a browser embedded within the app only

Disadvantages of Native Mobile Application Development

• Higher cost for building the app: Native apps developed for one platform will not run on another platform. An App built for Android will not run on iOS. We need to build a different App altogether for iOS. Because of this reason, we need to maintain multiple versions of the App.
• Even though you might publish native Apps, you’ll want to keep the mobile website well maintained, as mobile brings more traffic. So maintenance is higher..
• Distributed code base-having some features unavailable for iOS or Android still in 2020 some this infamous practice still exists.

Advantages of Hybrid Mobile Application Development

• Single Code Base
• Lower Cost
• Simpler to Build and Test
• Easier to maintain maintenance is simple, as there are not many versions to be maintained.
• Faster delivery time
• It has a browser embedded within the app only.
• It can be found in the App Store, which makes the distribution easy.
• It can take advantage of a few features available in the device.

Disadvantages of Hybrid Mobile Application Development

• Bounded efficiency-cross platform development frameworks depend on plugins to be connected with the device features
• Internet Connection-  when the user lacks an internet connection. cross-platform development frameworks require internet connections, meaning that some features and functions won’t be available if you don’t have an internet connection.
• Graphics are less accustomed to the operating system as compared to Native Apps.
• Hybrid Apps are slower than Native Apps.
• Faster delivery time

Forbes business magazine recently moved over a full-fledged PWA. The goal was to give mobile users a superior experience and boost mobile readership. Did it work? You bet it did. The PWA helped them increase engagement by 100 percent and there was a 43 percent boost in sessions per page.

Many top brands such as Starbucks, Twitter, Pinterest, and Virgin America have adopted PWA and are seeing improvements in not only in load times but also in their conversions.

Conclusion

The mobile games, mobile application, and web application software development trends that we discussed above are hot and happening now and more to come in 2022 But it’s also important to note that some of them are not exactly new. Some of them are in their second and third wave of adoption, making them more reliable and complex.

By embracing these technologies at the right time, businesses can be a part of real growth. And give their prospects/customers the best user experience they can. The same goes for the entire mobile games and mobile apps software development ecosystems that include freelancers, mobile, games app development, website, and digital marketing agencies, and software developers who can help their clients look beyond the regular and leverage new-age technology that can help further their reach.