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When talking about iOS and Android app development, most startups and businesses turn to two frameworks — Flutter and React Native. Both are used to cut costs and release apps faster. But which one is better?
In this article, we’ll tell you everything you need to know about Flutter and React Native: how they came about, when they’re used, and what’re their pros and cons. Tune in to see who the winner of the Flutter vs React Native debate is — in our opinion.
⚠️Warning: this is going to be a long article. There are so many aspects to compare when it comes to these frameworks — as we were writing, the details kept on piling up. We’ve added a navigation menu that you can use if you’re searching for something specific, like which of these cross-platform development frameworks is better for a startup ➡️
When it comes to mobile app development, React Native and Flutter are both very popular tools. They’re used widely by major corporations, outsourcing companies, and ambitious startups. But why? And which one is better if you’re planning to release your own mobile app?
Let’s take a step back. Mobile app development is a multi-faceted venture — you can approach it from different angles to create the product you want. It can go two ways: you may use either native or cross-platform tools. Flutter and React Native fall into the latter category — it’s easy to save money on development with them.
Cross-platform and native development are very different. It’s important to distinguish them — you can then decide which tools to use for your MVP. Read on to see what these methods entail and some of their main differences.
We’ve compiled a handy table with the pros and cons of each type of development — take a look:
Cross-platform development is exemplified by this motto: “write once, use anywhere”. One of its most distinct features is a single codebase. Doesn’t matter if you’re talking about mobile app development or web and desktop app development. You don’t have to write separate code for two versions of the app — one will be enough.
Here’re some other features of cross-platform mobile applications:
One programming language — cheap. You only need to know React Native or Flutter + standard markup languages, like HTML and CSS. That’s enough to create a solid app.
Consistent performance and user experience. Because both Android and iOS apps share code in this instance, they work in almost exactly the same way. There’s no possibility of an Android app looking completely different — and working as if it’s made from a different blueprint.
Ease of maintenance. Every platform releases updates: adding features and fixing bugs. A new OS version can affect the performance of your application – you can’t prevent it, you can only fix the bugs that pop up.
Cross-platform development makes this a bit simpler because of a shared codebase. Developers can spend less time ensuring the Flutter or React Native app works properly by fixing bugs in a single place — instead of searching through code on both Android and iOS versions.
Third-party integration support. Your developers can save resources by creating less features from scratch. Both React Native and Flutter have extensive feature libraries that work on both platforms.
If you were to develop an app natively, you’d have to search for different integrations that can function on both operating systems. That’d take at least twice as much time. The same thing applies to web app development for MacOS and Windows.
If you develop native mobile apps, you write it exclusively in a language a platform understands. You’d have to use Swift for iOS and Java for native Android apps.
Here are some features of native app development:
Two programming languages — expensive. You’d have to create two separate native app versions with different codebases, which takes more time. At the same time, you’d have to hire twice as many developers proficient in both Swift and Java. These two teams would require their own salaries.
Higher performance and user experience. Because of the nature of its code, native apps work fast, are more responsive, and take less time to download. But it’s a blessing and a curse, as it comes at a cost.
Harder maintenance. If you want to integrate new features, you’ll have to update two separate apps. The same goes if there are some bugs found — your overall QA will take more time and resources.
Third-party integration support. Each programming language, like Swift and Java, has its own programming libraries. They can be adapted to suit the needs of any app.
Overall, cross-platform frameworks are cheaper than native ones, and suit the needs of startups and small businesses even better than the rest. This is why we won’t be covering native frameworks in any more detail. Instead, let’s take a look at the pros and cons of cross-platform apps.
Let’s check out exactly why cross-platform apps in both mobile and web development are a popular choice — especially among startups and businesses looking to make an MVP. Here’s a table with a summary of its pros and cons:
We’ll begin with the pros: faster development, lower costs, and wider reach.
Both iOS and Android versions of your product will share a single codebase. Your developers will be able to work on them simultaneously — no need to jump between different versions to fix errors. This reduces the time-to-market.
You don’t have to hire two separate teams responsible for iOS and Android versions of the app. Nor do you need to wait twice the time for a single team to create apps for multiple platforms. This makes development cheaper and faster by up to 30%.
Most of the time when startups want to spend less on native mobile app development, they go with only one platform. For example, if most of their users are using iPhones, they’ll hire a Swift development team — foregoing an Android app entirely. Cross-platform app development lets you make a mobile app for both Android and iOS users while cutting costs, so you can expand your reach and get new clients.
Some parts of the code will have to be tailored to two different versions of the mobile app. Even then, it still takes less time than creating Android and iOS apps from scratch.
While the cross-platform app may feel like a native one, the latter version will still perform better. But for most users this difference is unnoticeable — it’s virtually impossible to distinguish which one’s native and which one’s not.
Let’s talk about React Native and Flutter. But first, we’ll briefly touch on the origins of these popular frameworks. This way, you can find out what company is responsible for it and how long it’s been in the market, so it’s easier to determine which one is better.
It was introduced in 2015 by Google. They wanted to create a framework that could easily render apps on any mobile platform. So the company had developers utilize its own programming language — Dart — to build mobile apps. In 2017, they announced a preview version of the framework in Shanghai, and the first stable version was unveiled in 2018.
Since then, Google has made plenty of improvements to both Dart and Flutter. For example, they’ve added support for several new APIs. API is a tech that acts as a negotiator of sorts — it helps iOS and Android understand what your app wants from them to work properly. As of now, Google is still maintaining and updating their framework.
In 2012, Facebook engineers grew weary of using HTML5 for their projects — it didn’t render apps fast enough, and there were major lagging issues. In search of solutions, they’ve discovered that some of their JavaScript tools could be used to create interfaces for mobile apps. A multi-year development journey of a framework with a great rendering engine began then and there.
In 2015, Meta finally unveiled React Native to the world. Its first stable version came about in 2017. Startups and development teams all over the world swear by it — many SaaS businesses have been created with React Native. And even now, this framework is updated regularly.
Let’s take a deep dive into each of these frameworks and what they entail. We’ll begin with Flutter.
Flutter is an open-source cross-platform framework. With it, developers can create mobile apps that work seamlessly. Meanwhile, business owners can save money — they don’t have to hire separate developer teams to roll out a functioning product.
Let’s take a closer look at the framework in the context of development time, performance, documentation, UI creation, and community support. We’ve prepared a table summarizing each capability — you’ll get to check out the features of this framework in depth.
Now we’ll take a closer look at these capabilities.
The apps may take 4-5 months to create. That’s because you’d have to take extra time organizing files with code for both iOS and Android. They wouldn’t work properly otherwise.
In many aspects, the framework can help save time substantially in contrast to native development. UI libraries with ready-made components are one of its reasons. Developers don’t need to code certain integrations, like payments, from scratch.
Overall, Flutter-based apps perform relatively well in comparison to native apps.
However, sometimes animations can seem a bit choppy, as the framework tends to render them at 60 fps.
Sometimes, animations inside Flutter apps can look choppy
To address potential performance issues, Flutter provides special features such as UI-related widgets that make an app run faster.
When it comes to cutting development time, documentation is essential. No development process goes by without at least one problem that is difficult to solve — it’s almost always the case. Documentation alleviates this. If it’s organized correctly, your developers will only have to search for the related issue in the documentation. They won’t have to spend hours or days thinking of ways to integrate a certain API, for example.
Flutter documentation is structured decently enough. It has several things essential for app development: e.g. physics, which shows how an in-app banner or ad will move if the user stops scrolling. Or Cupertino, which lets the app make use of iOS-style notifications and banners. Developers can quickly find the tech they need to integrate without making it up themselves. That saves you money.
Developers can create the app with ready-made widgets. Think of them as building blocks of your future mobile app. You can have blocks that are responsible for scrolling, animations, and image integrations. These blocks are gathered as app templates and specific code snippets, and they’re all available in the UI kit. It’s really simple to use.
These widgets are also easy to customize. This can save your resources. If you’ve thought of a feature for your MVP, a developer can simply alter an existing widget to accommodate your vision. They don’t have to make anything from scratch. You’ll get your idea up and running before any deadlines you may have.
Not only is this important for developers, but it also saves time and money for businesses. If you’re working with professional teams, chances are they’ll face some questions about MVP development or some integrations during the process. If there’s no community behind a mobile development framework, finding answers is impossible. Development stalls and the product is released later than scheduled.
Flutter has a big community. It has 171 thousand stars on GitHub, a popular repository where developers store their apps’ code. It’s a good rating, making it one of the most popular cross-platform frameworks in the world.
This leads to two things. The first is that the framework is convenient — it doesn’t have as many roadblocks when it comes to developing apps, so more specialists are inclined to use it. The second is that it’s easy to find answers if your team staggers at a certain point in development. In turn, your app rolls out on time, and you and your investors are pleased.
React Native is a cross-platform open-source framework based on React, which is a JavaScript-based library of code snippets. This allows developers to create apps with JavaScript only — a.k.a. the 6th most popular programming language in the world. The framework itself is also gaining popularity among businesses and developers alike, even after 10 years since its inception.
Let’s check out some of the features of React Native — through the lens of development time, performance, documentation, UI creation, and community support.
With React Native, fully functional MVPs can take 3-4 months to make. One of the reasons is third-party integrations. Many developers from the React community keep adding features that simplify development. You can add these components to your app with minimal adjustments. For example, camera APIs, video players, and payment integrations. Your developers can focus their attention on other things and significantly shorten the development time.
An example of such an integration is “hot reload”. Most of the time when developers are writing code for an app they see two things — a workspace where they’re writing code and a version of an app that reflects this code. After putting changes into the code, developers had to refresh the app to see how it looked. It wasn’t convenient and it took some time — it could accumulate and make development longer.
React Native apps may lag behind native apps by a small margin, but they work nicely overall. Most developers and companies, including us, swear by it — we’ve been using it for 10 years, and its issues are virtually undetectable by our customers and their users. It’s easy to achieve a native-like look, feel, and loading speed with it.
React Native has many nifty features that help optimize performance. One of these is called lazy loading. It’s when an app shows a screen or a feature only when it’s needed. So if you don’t tap an item card in an e-commerce app, it won’t load its full contents. This makes an app load and run faster.
Another feature is code splitting. It’s similar to lazy loading. In this case, the app’s native code is bundled into smaller chunks. When a user wants to access a certain feature, like paying for a product in an e-commerce app, the app will run the bundle responsible for payments. It’ll only do that the moment the user needs something from the app — after they buy the item, that particular native code bundle won’t be loading anymore. This also ensures that your clients enjoy using your app with little to no lag.
The documentation of React Native isn’t too extensive. At the same time, they have everything a professional development team may need to create a functioning product. For example, ways to integrate gesture controls into your app, or methods to add Android notifications to make your product more seamless to use.
Developers applaud React Native’s documentation for its simplicity and user-friendliness. It covers the main topics associated with development.
React Native already has built-in native design components. They can make your app feel and look like it’s been specifically designed for iOS and Android. For example, notifications and video players fall into this category — they’re made to fit in with the design standards of each platform. In turn, users find apps created with React Native a more enjoyable experience.
Because of third-party plugin support, React Native has a ton of community-made libraries with native components. If your developers can’t find something built-in, they can take features created by the community and implement them with almost no adjustments. If you want to create a fitness app, React Native developers can add ready-made calendars, trackers, and video players in a very short time. This saves you time and money on development.
This framework is lauded as one of the most popular cross-platform tools in the world. React Native has amassed a community of over 700,000 developers and gained over 117 thousand stars on GitHub. Because JavaScript is very popular and easy to get into, there’s no shortage of React Native developers who can help you create the right app for you.
The community keeps updating the framework and providing their own solutions. There are almost 1000+ community-made component libraries for React Native — your developers won’t have to reinvent the wheel to build a mobile app with the necessary features. You’ll find cost-saving, near-native UI components made by other developers that look exactly like the ones Android or iOS use.
With React Native, there’s no need to develop new native user interface components, and this reduces the overall time for development.
We made a comparison table with 9 features analyzed in detail. are some of the differences between React Native vs. Flutter relayed in depth.
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