How to select between iOS and Android App development platform?
Mobile apps are important for brands to reach a potential customer base. People prefer using the app as it is fast, responsive, interactive and easy to navigate. For brands, it becomes difficult to select a specific platform to develop a mobile app.
As a large part of the global mobile market share is covered by iOS and Android, the ideal approach is to build an app for both platforms. But that’s not a feasible way as a lot of constraints like time, budget and resources can stop you from doing that. A better approach to consider is launching on one platform first and then later introducing it for the second platform. Both platforms have different benefits, so it’s crucial to do enough research to know which OS helps in achieving your brand goals.
This blog post is a guide to examine both the iOS and Android platform in four key areas to help you decide which is the right choice for your mobile app.
1. Target Audience
The audience for both platforms are different and to choose the ideal platform, you need to specify which audience is crucial to your business. Android covers the biggest global market share and gets more app downloads than iOS. Android might draw more downloads, but iOS observes higher engagement rates and users spend more on apps. Also, Android observes a lot of popularity in developing countries, while iOS is quite popular in developed countries in Europe.
2. Better Revenue
Revenue plays a big role in identifying which platform to build an app. Each platform claims of better revenue in the end. But, according to reports iOS apps make more money. Even though iOS has fewer users and app downloads, still it makes more revenue. iOS is a more lucrative platform to earn more revenue through a subscription model or app downloads. On the other hand, Android apps earn revenue with an ad-based strategy and an increase of 25 percent in consumer expenditure is observed every year.
3. Fast Development
Reaching to market is also a vital parameter to select an app development platform. Your timeline is crucial to determine the platform. Android usually takes more time due to longer update cycles and device compatibility. Building an app for multiple Android devices usually takes more time as all have a variety of screen sizes, resolutions and OS versions running. On the other hand, Apple owns all the hardware and software still, developers have more screen sizes and UI constraints to deal with. Building for iOS is faster, still, it takes time to get approval due to strict regulations and quality checks.
4. Cost
The budget of mobile app development depends on the scale and complexity of the project; the larger a project is, the higher it is going to cost. There are no specific pricing details about what makes one platform more expensive than the other. Obviously, if you are targetting a large number of devices and OS versions, costing will be higher as more time and resources are needed.
Finally, to make a decision of selecting a mobile app platform depends completely on your business model. To start with one platform and later switching to another is an ideal approach. Android is a better platform to start with and for that, you can hire android app developers from a reputed development company. They will develop the best app integrating all your requirements.
Conclusion:
Choosing the right platform depends on the content and business goals of the app. Both the platforms are different in operations and demographics. The above four key areas are discussed in detail to help you in selecting the best one.
