You install it like a native app, but it’s actually a web app on the inside.
Hybrid apps, like web apps, are built with Javascript, HTML, and CSS and run in something called web view, a simplified browser within your app
Hybrid apps refer to applications that combine both the native app and web app.
Let’s grasp the main characteristics of a hybrid app:
- Technology: built on HTML, CSS and JavaScript, platform-agnostic.
- Access to native API: hybrid apps can access native APIs due to the solutions that bridge the native SDK and the WebView the apps run in.
- Distribution method: through app stores.
- Multi-platform capability: reusable codebase is distributed across multiple platforms.
Why Hybrid?
The Native vs Hybrid app debate is complicated, and even though we’ve just shown you some key benefits of building a native app, there are certainly advantages to going hybrid. Let’s take a look at them. Say you have an idea for an app and you don’t know if people will like it or not. Your goal is to put something usable into their hands as quickly as possible. You’re short on resources, so you need to create a simple version of your product that still provides value. In the startup world, this is called an MVP, or minimum viable product. Building a web app might be the truly minimal option, but it won’t really allow you to test whether people will download and use an app on their device.
Hybrid app advantages:
- Only one codebase needs to be developed for multiple platforms.
- Hybrid apps can access the device’s internal APIs and device hardware.
- Unlike the web app, the hybrid doesn’t need a web browser.
Hybrid app disadvantages:
- Have a slower speed compared to the native application and web application.
- Users have to be dependent on a third-party platform to deploy the app’s wrapper.
- Comparing the native application vs hybrid application, the latter approach provides a poorer user experience.
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