Is React Native suit­able for iOS App Devel­op­ment in 2022?

What’s com­mon on Pin­ter­est, Face­book, and Instagram?

Did you answer — ​“Well, they are all social media?”

Yes, but they have some­thing else in com­mon, which many peo­ple are unaware of. These lead­ing social media apps are built on the React Native plat­form!

So, it’s not a shock­er that React Native, an open source frame­work, is the talk of the town. After all, there must be some rea­son why the world’s glob­al tech giants and sev­er­al exist­ing apps are mov­ing to React Native.

This Blog Will Discuss: 

1. What’s React Native? Is it worth the hype?

2. Is React Native good for iOS Development?

3. Why should Star­tups choose to React Native for iOS mobile development?

What is React Native? Why Is It Grow­ing In Popularity?

Google Trends React Native Graph

React Native is an open-source frame­work that relies on JavaScript to build web appli­ca­tions and soft­ware devel­op­ment. It’s famous for its tagline, ​“Learn once, write any­where.” Built by Face­book, it’s a fan­tas­tic cross-plat­form frame­work that allows devel­op­ers to use a sin­gle code base for mul­ti­ple plat­forms.

But Why Was React Native Built? 

Face­book strug­gled to main­tain two sep­a­rate code bases for its mobile app. For every new fea­ture they test­ed or launched, they had to make changes to Java in Android and Swift in iOS.

This slowed down the progress and led to dupli­ca­tion of work. With React Native, Face­book works only with JavaScript, so devel­op­ers can write once and deploy changes every­where. 

The Pop­u­lar­i­ty Of React Native

Sta­tista

• Accord­ing to Sta­tista, React Native is the 2nd most famous cross-plat­form devel­op­ment frame­work, with a 38% mar­ket share.
• Accord­ing to Stack­Over­flow, 57.9% of devel­op­ers showed inter­est in React Native.

Is React Native Good For iOS App Development?

This sec­tion will exam­ine a few cri­te­ria to under­stand what React Native offers for iOS app development.

Which Brands Are Using React Native for iOS App Devel­op­ment in 2022?

#1. Face­book

Face­book

Face­book knew it had to be faster if it want­ed to stay com­pet­i­tive in the social media mar­ket. Thus, their team decid­ed to work on React Native. The results were bet­ter than before!

• The app ran faster than built, and the con­tent loaded quickly.
• It also wit­nessed the mete­oric rise in the speed of dash­board start­up time.

#2. Bloomberg

In 2016, Bloomberg decid­ed to build a React Native mobile app for their web­site. The end goal was to pro­vide easy access to per­son­al­ized con­tent. The com­pa­ny also want­ed to pro­vide an inter­ac­tive user expe­ri­ence (UI UX) and user inter­face using live video feeds and libraries.

The result was bet­ter than expected:

• The team was able to test new fea­tures quick­ly to improve the user expe­ri­ence of the native mobile application.
• The app reloads quickly.

#3. Wal­mart

Wal­mart is an eCom­merce giant with a group of sev­er­al brands like ASDA, Sam’s Club, Wal­mart gro­cery, and oth­ers. Each brand has its own IT require­ment, mak­ing mobile devel­op­ment more complex.

Until 2016, Wal­mart sim­ply embed­ded web views on mobile apps, severe­ly affect­ing their per­for­mance. How­ev­er, once they shift­ed to React Native, the results were astound­ing: 

• User expe­ri­ence improved as React Native app yield­ed smooth and native-like UI.
• They were able to share 95% of the code­base between Android and iOS apps.
• Wal­mart also high­light­ed that they need­ed only a JavaScript devel­op­ment team to devel­op their mobile app and launch it on the App Store.

These are just a few exam­ples of com­pa­nies lever­ag­ing the pow­er of React Native. Sev­er­al glob­al giants, includ­ing Vogue, Shopi­fy, Pin­ter­est, Sales­force, Skype, and Wix, have built their iOS apps on React Native, thanks to its robust features.

Star­tups and React Native: The Best Duo

Unlike estab­lished busi­ness­es, things move fast, like real fast in star­tups. There’s no room for mis­takes when it comes to launch­ing their mobile appli­ca­tions. Star­tups have dif­fer­ent needs from estab­lished busi­ness­es like

• Work with tight dead­lines: Star­tups move quick­ly, which means strict dead­lines. As a result, there is less or no wig­gle room to make mis­takes. Each mis­take can take the start­up near failure.
• Need for faster iter­a­tion: Star­tups can­not wait for years to launch react native appli­ca­tions. They need to test faster and launch faster to gen­er­ate revenue.

And that’s what makes React Native a per­fect com­pan­ion for star­tups. It ful­fills all the con­di­tions that star­tups need to grow.

Build­ing iOS Apps With React Native Can Ben­e­fit Your Start­up in many ways like

• Faster time to mar­ket: Pin­ter­est man­aged iOS app devel­op­ment in 10 days and launched it to pub­lic users! Like Pin­ter­est, star­tups need to launch the app quick­ly and start test­ing; React Native is the best bet here.
• Hot Reload­ing: Hot Reload­ing is the abil­i­ty to inject new code into the source course while the app runs. This means you don’t lose the state. The app reloads auto­mat­i­cal­ly when code changes, thus accel­er­at­ing the devel­op­ment time.
• Sup­ports third-par­ty plu­g­ins: Due to lim­it­ed time and resources, star­tups do not have enough time to code a new func­tion from scratch. That’s when already estab­lished third-par­ty plu­g­ins come to the res­cue. So, for instance, if you want to enhance your app’s main func­tion­al­i­ty, you can sim­ply use a third-par­ty plu­g­in instead of cod­ing from scratch.

When To Choose React Native to Devel­op iOS apps? 

You may vouch for using or not using React Native for iOS app devel­op­ment, but we have high­light­ed the main points to help you choose. Let’s get started:

Use React Native For IOS Mobile Devel­op­ment If…

#1. If You Don’t Know Your Tar­get Audience:

Most star­tups and some­times even grow­ing com­pa­nies don’t know their tar­get audi­ence and hence fail to increase their ROI. Then anoth­er prob­lem is star­tups are always con­fused about what plat­form to choose, Android or iOS.

In such cas­es, React Native allows star­tups to focus on both plat­forms equal­ly and then find their tar­get audience.

2. Cost Effi­cien­cy Is a Priority

Not all busi­ness­es can afford two sep­a­rate mobile apps and devel­op­ment teams for iOS and Android. More­over, even if the aim is to devel­op an iOS mobile app, the native iOS app devel­op­ment cost can be much high­er than build­ing a React Native app.

Why?

Because native iOS app devel­op­ers are few­er, find­ing the best suit­able match can take months. The cash-crunched star­tups and small busi­ness­es nei­ther have a bud­get nor have time to wait longer to build the app.

At such time, React Native allows them to launch in both the iOS and Android mar­kets to stay competitive.

You Should­n’t Use React Native For iOS Devel­op­ment If:

Despite its advan­tages, React Native is not a per­fect, one-size-fits-all frame­work. This means there are cir­cum­stances where React Native should­n’t be used for iOS app development.

#1. Appli­ca­tions With Com­plex Interfaces 

React Native is not the frame­work for cre­at­ing com­plex inter­faces, regard­less of how many pre-made UI com­po­nents it offers. Build­ing iOS apps with RN would be dis­as­trous if the app required com­plex ges­tures, heavy ani­ma­tions, or hard­ware fea­tures like the cam­era, touch ID, GPS, etc. For iOS app devel­op­ment Swift and oth­er native devel­op­ment frame­works are bet­ter choic­es for cre­at­ing com­plex interfaces.

#2. Your App Is Explic­it­ly Cre­at­ed for iOS

Pig­gy­back­ing on the pre­vi­ous point, if your main goal is to make an iOS-cen­tric app, it’s bet­ter to use a cre­ate react native app.

Remem­ber, React Native is known for its ​“cross-plat­form” features.

So, unless you plan to move to react native Android apps in the future, it won’t serve the pur­pose. No mat­ter how much effort your devel­op­ers put in, React Native web apps will always feel infe­ri­or in qual­i­ty due to miss­ing native func­tion­al­i­ties and user experience.

Read also about Why Would You Build An App On React Native Over Swift?

Final Take­aways 

• We are using React Native apps (Hel­lo, Face­book, and Pin­ter­est) with­out even knowing.
• In the end, you work with JavaScript when devel­op­ing IOS apps with React Native Com­po­nents. So, you don’t need spe­cial­ized Swift or iOS devel­op­ers to build apps.
• React Native and native APIs are grow­ing each day, show­ing no time to stop soon.

There are umpteen ben­e­fits of iOS devel­op­ment using React Native. So, now that you know that React Native is right for iOS apps, it’s time to search for a reli­able React Native app devel­op­ment com­pa­ny to turn your dream app into reality.

Hire React Native App Devel­op­ment Com­pa­ny For Your Next Project

Here, we pro­vide React Native app devel­op­ment ser­vices to help you build an IOS app. Drop us a mes­sage here — We will be thrilled to help you! 

FAQ:

1. Can you build an iOS app with React Native?

Yes! React Native is a cross-plat­form app devel­op­ment frame­work that works on most ecosystems.

2. What are the ben­e­fits of React Native app development?

React Native app devel­op­ment has sev­er­al ben­e­fits, including

• Low cost of development
• Faster time to market.
• Avail­abil­i­ty of third-par­ty plugins
• Large com­mu­ni­ty support

3. How much time does it take to devel­op an iOS app from React Native? 

It depends on sev­er­al fac­tors as they decide the time tak­en for iOS app devel­op­ment with RN. How­ev­er, a sim­ple iOS app can be built as fast as 10 days, where­as com­plex apps can take any­where between 1.5 months to three months.