Progressive Web Apps: What to Expect?

When talking about web development, Progressive Web Apps have been a buzzword for a while. But will your company benefit from going down the PWA road? Read about the pros and cons of this technology and see how you can benefit from it in 2022.

Progressive web apps are by their nature an evolving trend. A survey of e-commerce decision makers revealed that 9% of e-commerce companies planned on investing in progressive web apps (PWA) in 2021. Research suggests that the financial value of the progressive web application market will reach a value of 10.77 billion dollars by 2027, representing annual growth of over 30% between now and that time.

The main benefit of PWA design is that it is mostly platform-independent. This means that an app can be developed using a single codebase and deployed on several different platforms. Platform independence combined with the fact that PWAs are inherently installable makes an app’s rollout onto multiple platforms easy. Users can download and install PWAs just like they can with any native app, rather than relying on a browser to access them, making the user experience seamless and intuitive. PWAs also enjoy the benefits of modern website design in that they are responsive and lightweight. An added benefit of PWAs as distinct web apps is that they are discoverable by search engine indexing.

The major drawback to PWA design is that there are some limitations on platform and hardware support. Since PWAs run in a browser, they do not have direct access to all of the capabilities of a platform that a native app built using a platform’s SDK, would have access to. Some platforms also have restricted support for these apps, though support and capabilities are constantly evolving.

However, every major platform including iOS, Mac, Android, and PC now offers some level of PWA support. Android provides the best support, with iOS and Mac being the most limited. Apple’s strict control over the apps available on its platform is the biggest hindrance to PWA’s adoption on iOS.

Should you use PWA in 2022 and beyond?

If your product strategy requires fast market entry and coverage of multiple platforms with a single codebase - PWA might be a choice. Progressive web apps allow startup companies to quickly and easily develop and distribute a progressive web app and benefit from the minimal time and money needed to roll out the app in the case of limited resources. Encouraging the first time users to revisit the application and getting them engaged with the help of push notifications and in-app banners make PWAs the powerful tool for marketing strategy implementation.

Larger corporations can also benefit from providing value to their users with limited access to high-performance platforms or who prefer a more streamlined, lightweight experience. PWA can be a choice for development of an enterprise software tied to a selected single platform to benefit from the important native features supported exactly by this platform.

More detailed information about Progressive Web Apps can be found at: https://mobidev.biz/blog/why-when-use-progressive-web-app-pwa-development

MobiDev is a US/Ukraine software engineering company focused on helping visionaries create their products. The company invests into technology research and has years of experience building AI-powered solutions, implementing machine learning, augmented reality, and IoT.