Cross-platform app development is among the trendiest topics right now. A lot of companies are choosing hybrid frameworks over native ones. Due to the increase in demand, the cross-platform domain has seen a huge spike in the number of frameworks. The more choices are available and it is making harder to determine which option is best for a given cross-platform development.
Flutter and Xamarin are the two popular cross-platform development frameworks at the moment. Here but which one is better?
Xamarin
Xamarin is an open-source framework for cross-platform development. It helps the developer in creating the application by using .NET languages that are able to run on multiple platforms without any need to port or rewrite code.
Uses Of Xamarin
Xamarin is used in situations when the code and the business need to be shared across multiple platforms. It facilitates cross-platform application development using the C# with the visual studio.
It is a technology that is built upon the .NET legacy. Building the app in Xamarin is easier if you have a basic understanding of how things in .NET and Visual Studio work.
The popular application built with Xamarin includes Mile of Music, American Cancer Society, FreshDirect, and Seeing AI| Microsoft.
Flutter
Flutter is also an open-source cross-platform framework used in app development to develop iOS and Android apps. It is designed in a way that allows the developer an easy-to-use cross-platform development interface and optimizes performance for the users. It is popular for its native-like approach on modern devices.
Uses of Flutter
The framework enables the developers to build mobile apps that run on iOS and android at the same time. It is known for its excellent performance and provides a great experience for the developer. the framework used Dart programming language and offer portability with the source code.
Some popular applications that were built using the Flutter framework include Abbey Road Studios, ROMWE, PassKeep, and TOYOTA.
Why Use Xamarin?
Great Performance
Application built with the Xamarin framework is known for its great performance metrics. It is because of the excellent optimization in the API of Xamarin. The team Xamarin offers a concerted effort to imitate native-like performance.
Hot reload
Xamarin introduced the hot reload that help in the observation of changes to the source code in real time.
Complete Ecosystem
It offers an unmatched ecosystem of development frameworks to create all sorts of applications. C#, Xamarin, and. NET on Microsoft Visual Studio can design stellar products.
Limitation Of Xamarin
- It takes time for the updates to reflect in the Xamarin tools which can cause hurdles in the process of app development.
- Xamarin app takes around five to ten MBs extra size to release a version of the app because of its cross-platform nature.
- Creating an app with a complex UX will get tricky within Xamarin because of the customization of UIs to the platform.
Why Use Flutter?
Shallow Learning Curve
It is much easier to use Flutter than other cross-platform frameworks because it provides the focus to keep the codebase simple.
High Performing Rate
With the ahead-of-time compilation, the framework claims to match the native-like performance metrics. It has unmatched code reusability and performance that make it the perfect framework.
Free Of Cost
The best thing about the framework is that it is free to use.
Limitation Of Flutter
- One drawback of writing in Flutter is that there are fewer community-general libraries to use with the framework.
- Flutter is a Google product which means it is naturally inclined more toward the Android side of things.
- It comes with a lot of baggage because of its cross-platform nature like Xamarin which makes the app large in size.
