react js mobile apps
The evolution of React Native technology is quite fascinating. What started of as Facebook’s internal Hackathon project in 2013 is now one of the trending frameworks for Android and iOS app development. In March 2015, Facebook, in its F8 conference announced availability of React Native on Github. And now, developers are making the most of modern web techniques on mobile.It corresponds with today’s mobile app development market needs, as with two operating systems dominating the landscape, enterprises creating mobile apps often face a decision: build apps that give a better user experience or apps that are faster to develop and run on more platforms and devices?
The concept of creating apps using only one paradigm for all platforms sounds a bit unbelievable. However, React Native, despite its immaturity, allows to accelerate the process of building apps across different platforms, thanks to the likelihood of reusing most of the code between them.
Instagram accepted the challenge to integrate React Native into their existing native app beginning from the simplest view you can imagine: the Push Notification view which was basically implemented as the WebView. It did not require building navigation infrastructure, as UI was quite simple.
Why did they choose React Native?
The dev team at Instagram faced a few problems on the way, but they substantially improved developer velocity. 85% to 99% of code was shared between Android and iOS apps, depending on products, thus the team was able to deliver the app much faster than they would have with a native solution.
UberEats
Although React Native covers a small part of this app, it adds a significant experience for the users in terms of UI and UX. The app needed to have a dashboard for restaurants with functions like sound notifications, push notifications. Since their team have experience with React previously, building the app using React Native came out to be a smart and successful solution.
SoundCloud Pulse
SoundCloud Pulse is an application for creators that helps them manage their accounts and keep their community humming. When the company started designing the second set of native apps, they faced a few obstacles. iOS developers were impossible to find and they didn’t want to have a huge gap between the iOS and Android releases. Therefore, an independent research team started to run user-testing sessions with React Native apps prototypes (learn more: IT Team Augmentation).
Why did they choose React Native?
Their experience with the framework was generally positive. Developers found it easier to workon a React Native-based application than on a native application. Moreover, they were capable of building the application by themselves without frequent input from specialised mobile developers.
Myntra
Myntra exemplifies how an online shopping portal on mobile be like. From perfect look and feel to finest user experience, the app makes shopping on mobile quite convenient. With beautiful presentation of catalogs, profiles, order placement, React Native is surely offering an amazing UI and UX to the Android and iOS apps.
Wix
Started in 2006, Wix is an online company that provides web hosting and website design services. Users can design and build their sites in HTML5/CSS, as well as mobile websites, using drag and drop utilities. Two popular features of Wix are that developers can create their own web applications to market to other users, and that users do not need to know any coding to create a website.
There are several navigation options available for handling navigation in react native apps like React-native-router-flux, react-navigation, airbnb-native-navigation and wix-react-native-navigation out of which I prefer to use react-native-navigation because of its extremely configurable navigation and screen options along with properly maintained and updated codebase.
Discovery VR
Discovery VR brings the adventure on an app through VR or 360 videos. The app also hosts exclusive content from shows like Deadliest Catch, SharkWeek etc. The UI of the app is written in React Native and offers seamless VR experience to the users.
Townske & React Native
Townske aims to be your travel inspiration city guide on your next trip. The app connects you with locals to get a list of their favorite places and creates a curated list of places to explore and experience as locals do. It’s not mandatory for users to have an account, which is great, as it allows you to quickly find the next location you want to visit.
Imagine that you have low Wi-Fi connectivity, or that your battery is running low – in these cases, it’s a neat feature to have.
Why did they choose React Native?
React Native is focused solely on building a mobile UI. Compared with JavaScript frameworks like AngularJS or MeteorJS, React Native is UI-focused, making it more like a JavaScript library than a framework.
The resulting UI is highly responsive and feels fluid thanks to asynchronous JavaScript interactions with the native environment. This means the app will have faster and smooth load times than a typical hybrid app, and a smoother feel.