Imagine having apps that you didn’t have to download and could access without an internet connection? Well, that’s what you can do with progressive apps. These apps will give you a much better user experience with its cross-platform ability.
What are Progressive Web Apps?
Progressive web apps are application software that is accessible through the web and built using HTML, JavaScript, and CSS. Its cross-platform capability allows it to work on both desktop and mobile devices. Progressive web apps have a wide range of features including the capability to work offline, having access to the phone’s sensors, ability to stay on the user’s home screen, push notifications, background processing in service workers, and more.
Unlike Apple Store or Google Play, you don’t need to install these apps to use them. You can find them easily on the web and start using them right away. These apps support most of the browsers like Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, Microsoft Edge, and more.
The idea of progressive web apps was first developed by Steve Jobs back in 2007. Later, in 2015 Alex Russel, the developer Chrome, and Frances Berriman refreshed the idea of Steve Jobs and wanted to use a single codebase to create apps for various devices. Google then backed up this idea and started working on progressive web apps.
Giant companies like Forbes, Alibaba, Twitter, Uber, and others are the early adopters of these apps. Soon there will be mass adoption of progressive web apps as companies are finding these apps much better than the previous web apps and the mobile apps as well.
Best PWA Development Frameworks
The ability to perform well on any device and browser and having a lot of new features made progressive web apps (PWA) popular today. If you want to build PWA then there are lots of frameworks available. Here are the best PWA frameworks you can choose from.
React PWA library
This framework was created by Facebook in 2013. It is very popular for front-end web development. It is used by Instagram, Facebook, WhatsApp, and other big companies. Every day more than a billion users test it. So, you can rely on it. You can create apps with it that are scalable and flexible.
Advantages
• Create both single page and multi-page apps.
• Generate server-side and client-side pages by using NextJS and GatsbyJS.
• Has a huge online community, making progressive web application development easier.
• Detailed documentation.
• The components are developed with JavaScript which makes them reusable.
• Scalable and flexible.
Angular
This is one of the oldest progressive web application development framework developed by Google in 2010. To use this framework, you will need good coding skills and have knowledge about TypeScript.
Advantages
• Lets the users maintain the web infrastructures conveniently.
• Allows fast application development and has lots of functionalities.
• Has a huge community of developers and Google undergoes constant improvements.
Vue
It is one of the most popular PWA frameworks. Unlike React and Angular that are driven by Facebook and Google, respectively, Vue is created by an individual, so is driven by the community as it’s open source.
Advantages
• Various packages available for server-side rendering, so it streamlines the development process considerably.
• Provide clear documentation that’s easily understandable, so simplifies coding.
• Possible to create both simple and complex applications.
Iconic
It is a good progressive web app framework for cross-platform mobile applications. The websites can get a similar appearance to the native applications using this framework. It has created more than 5 million hybrid apps till now.
Advantages
• More than 250 built-in plug-ins that help to give the native application appearance to the progressive web applications.
• Has its foundation on Angular and Apache Cordova.
• Has an extensive library and you can access the APIs without coding.
Polymer
This is an open-source progressive web app framework developed by Google. There are various templates and web components that are supported by various browsers.
Advantages
• Has a responsive design.
• Uses reusable web components thus making it easy for the developers.
• Has embedded development tools, and so no debugging tools are required.
• Localization possible.
When choosing a particular PWA development framework, you should compare the backup, documentation, performance, and other details. If you can choose a good framework, it will speed up the development process.
Best Tools for Developing PWA
As progressive web applications are getting more popular, various tools are now available to help in developing these applications more conveniently. Here are the best progressive web app development tools available today.
Workbox
This progressive web app development tool is created by Google. It has various libraries and modules to facilitate the development and improve the performances of the progressive web app.
Knockout
It is an open-source tool and is very useful in the development of progressive web apps. Coding becomes simpler with this tool as you can define views and declarative bindings. It runs on JavaScript and can work on various web frameworks and browsers.
PWABuilder
Using this progressive web app development tool you can develop a service operator for offline works. You won’t need to do much development work if you use this tool. If you are someone who is new to the concept of progressive apps then you can use this tool to create an app with minimum budget and effort.
Webpack
It is a very useful tool for building progressive web apps using JavaScript. It will make it easy for you to manage dependencies. One of the main features of PWA is that it can work offline and poor Internet connection as well. Webpack helps to implement the offline functionalities.
SuperPWA
This tool will streamline the process of developing progressive web apps. You can create top-quality offline pages with it. The users will have an ‘Add to Home Screen’ notification on the screens of their desktop or mobile once you have this tool.
These tools will help you to speed up the development of progressive web apps. You will get lots of functionalities with these tools that will give a better user experience.
Conclusion
Companies now understand the value of progressive web apps and they are developing it for their websites. It is vital to choose the right framework for creating these apps as the features, functionality, and user experience will depend on it. As the frameworks are scalable, they can meet your future needs as well. Using the right tools can make the app development work faster and more convenient. If you have a team of experienced application development specialists then you will be able to create top-notch progressive web applications.
Read Also : Benefits of a good user interface for Enterprise Application Development
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