Last updated on December 22nd, 2023 at 10:41 am
React Native and Flutter are the most advanced and widely used cross-platform software for mobile apps development for 2 years in a row, as per Statista. With time they are growing bigger, each day several businesses adopting these technologies. React Native and Flutter application development services can help you market and grow your business fast.
This article will learn what makes them so popular, understand the differences and similarities between Flutter vs. React Native, and which one is a better choice for app development and why.
React Native vs Flutter – The Detailed Comparison
1. Performance
Cross-platform development aims to provide support for multiple platforms. Lets’ have a look at React Native and Flutters’ performance on various devices such as desktop, mobile, and web. React Native is written in JavaScript, it is a Mobile Application Framework and Flutters’ programming language is Dart, it is a UI Software Development Kit (SDK) for mobile apps. Both tools allow create mobile apps, web, desktop, and embedded applications.
Several research results show that JavaScript works faster and consumes less memory comparatively. That means JavaScript is more powerful and saves more resources.
Mobile Performance
The startup community conducted multiple performance tests on iOS and Android. Results show that Flutter is comparatively faster than React Native. The performance of React Native was lower in memory-intensive test and compute-intensive tasks than Flutter.
Web Performance
For website development React Native shines high. JavaScript along with HTML and CSS allows faster and smoother development of websites. On the other hand, Dart is not a popular language for website development. However, you definitely can develop a website from Flutter mobile app code quickly.
2. Design and Graphics Features
Both React Native and Flutter include impressive graphical and animation features. Though, both have entirely different approaches to design user interfaces. React Native offers a smooth and personalized experience with its visual tools, navigation, appearance, etc. Its native visual elements provide a native look and feel.
Flutter provides hybrid frameworks like Xamarian, Cordova looks and feel. It doesn’t give a native look and feel, however, you need to put some additional effort to achieve a native look.
3. Time to market
Both the technologies use a single codebase that allows developers to reuse the code for iOS, Android devices, web, and desktop. Since there is no need to write separate codes, it saves a lot of resources, time, effort, and cost. However, below are some factors that have a significant impact on time-to-market for a mobile app.
Community
React Native is pretty older and therefore has a big community. It has generated a great amount of data, a set of various solutions, and libraries so far. However, sometimes it is quite challenging to choose the solution out of many solutions which will be most suitable for a particular scenario.
Flutter came in 2017, probably 2 years later than React Native. From the very start, it was greatly supported by Google engineers and has comparatively better documentation.
Preference by Developers
In a survey conducted by Stackoverflow on 65,000 developers to know their preference, Flutter won the race, though with a slight difference. It secured 3rd place with 69% among the most wanted non-web frameworks. React Native secured 10th place with 58% of preferences.
Developer availability
Finding React Native developers are much easy than flutter developers. React Native is in JavaScript language, so most of the developers are familiar with it. They take a little time to upskill with it.
Flutter is based on Dart language and it is a different language from traditional web development technology. The Junior generation of developers take more interest and finding a Flutter developer is pretty tough.
4. Reliability and Further Support
Both the frameworks are introduced by IT giants, React Native by Facebook and Flutterby Google. Both are open-source frameworks. They have some of their own applications like Facebook is a React Native app, Google Ads and Google Pay are Flutter apps. This enhances their reliability, chances of further development and strengthens their support community. You will not find a problem finding React Native App Developers for your project.
5. Compatibility and Features
Flutter provides support for several different resolutions on multiple devices including Android 4.1+ or iOS 8+. React Native is compatible with Android 4.1+ and iOS 10+. Sometimes, you need additional features for a native look in Flutter and React Native as well.
Geolocation and Mapping
Google team has designed several different plugins for Flutter. It has great tracking features in its apps. React Native tracking feature can be enhanced by writing code of some elements in the native devices’ programming languages, however, its one-time tracking works perfectly, the issues occur only in continuous tracking.
Device’s Camera
The camera works well in Flutter apps, however, some issues came up when using the camera in React Native apps. Again, this can be simply overcome by some additional time and resources.
Video Chats
With Flutter, an external plugin is required for custom video chats; however, with React Native this is quickly implemented natively.
Analytics
Both the platform’s analytics tools performance is pretty good. React Native app’s performance is sometimes affected only when there are a great number of analytic events to be reported.
Advanced Security Features
Both the platform offers a comprehensive and high level of security for mobile apps. Some suggested measures for security are- use of fewer 3rd party libraries and fewer data stored on the client-side is always considered better. Stored data on mobile devices must be encrypted.
6. Popularity
Both the platform are popular, however, React Natives’ adoption rate is comparatively high. As per the insights of Stackoverflow React Native secures 6th place and got 11.50% votes when it is about to choose non-web frameworks, libraries, and tools and, Flutter secures 9th position with 7.20% votes.
Flutter apps category can be divided majorly into 5 types: shopping, social, finance, and productivity. The example of some top apps is eBay, Philips, Alibaba, BMW, and Google Ads.
The major categories of React Native apps are home, events, food and beverages, shopping, and business. Some of the popular apps are skype, Instagram, Shopify, Salesforce, etc.
7. Market Trends
In today’s tech-era, the advancement in technology is faster and everything around is also changing fast. Earlier React Native dominated the market in cross-platform development, now flutters’ adoption rate growing speedily. Perhaps, flutter may overtake the leadership in no time, it’s just a matter of time.
8. Experts’ Opinions
Nick who is a Tech Leader of the Mobile Development department at NIX and was a former Senior React Native Developer shares his experience of React Native and Flutter. He says both the platform have awesome features like code reusability and hot reload that makes development tasks simple and fast, however, both have some downsides as well such as stage management.
Furthermore, Flutters’ performance is flawless and unlike React Native, there is no need to use additional APIs. However, React Native offers a great native appearance and has an effective and flexible API.
When we compare both of them, there are a variety of factors you need to take care of; you can do the comparison based on various parameters. Flutter App Development wins the race when we talk about performance, features, development cost, compatibility, and further market trends.
However, when we talk about the availability of developers, React Native App Development is a good choice. It is also more suitable for the development task with simple functionality and others tasks like social media, events, eCommerce, etc.
React Native is preferable if you are an established setup because it will be easy to market natively looking apps faster. Flutter is recommended when functionality is your priority than impressive design.
Conclusion
The best way to choose the right technology is as per your specifications, you need to understand well first that what suits your requirement best. If you mistakenly choose the wrong solution, do not make the right decision to choose the right technology; it may adversely affect your business growth.
If you are struggling to choose the right technology for your business you can take help from some experts or hire the services of a Cross-platform Application Development company. They will help you better to choose the most suitable technology for your mobile app development project.
Naveen Khanna is the CEO of eBizneeds, a company renowned for its bespoke web and mobile app development. By delivering high-end modern solutions all over the globe, Naveen takes pleasure in sharing his rich experiences and views on emerging technological trends. He has worked in many domains, from education, entertainment, banking, manufacturing, healthcare, and real estate, sharing rich experience in delivering innovative solutions.
