Hybrid Mobile App Development

An hybrid app is a mix between a native app and a web app. In an hybrid app development approach, a significant portion of the application is written in cross-platform web technologies, while direct access to native features are maintained when required. The native portion of the app uses the OS application programming interfaces (APIs) to create an embedded HTML rendering engine that serves as a bridge between the browser and the device APIs. Thanks to this bridge the hybrid app can take full advantage of all the smartphone's features. The web portion of the hybrid app can be either a web page that resides on a server or a set of HTML, JavaScript, CSS and media files packaged into the application code and stored locally on the mobile.

Because the bridge acts as an added interface between the app and the mobile's features, hybrid apps tend to run slower than native apps. Hybrid apps can also run equally faster or slower than web apps whose web portion is hosted on a server. Furthermore – when this is the case and unless cached on the mobile – the web content is only accessible when Internet is available. Usually an hybrid app would work partially offline.

If you're looking for a mobile app that needs access to native mobile features, easy to maintain and that can be ported to other platforms without much re-coding efforts then a hybrid mobile app is likely to be what you need.

At Red Flag we've released mobile apps that maximise the mobile user's experience. We have extensive knowledge and experience in covering the full mobile app development project lifecycle from taking the initial requirements and presenting a mockup to deploy the mobile app on the market and closely monitor its performance. Contact us to discuss your mobile app project.