Unleash the Full Potential of Your Web App
How to convert it to a Native Mobile App in 3 easy steps!
As a web developer, I’ve always been envious of the perceived authenticity and credibility that comes with having a native mobile app available in the app store. In my experience, no matter how good a web application is, people often prefer to access it through a dedicated mobile app rather than a web browser.
No matter how good a web application is, people often prefer to access it through a dedicated mobile app!
To leverage my web development skills and create native mobile applications, I’ve explored several options, including popular frameworks such as React Native. While React Native is a fantastic solution, especially when used with Expo, I have encountered some issues with it.
In this article, I will share my experiences with converting web applications to native mobile apps and provide a step-by-step guide for developers looking to do the same. Whether you’re a seasoned web developer or just starting out, you’ll learn how to turn your web app into a native mobile app in just 3 easy steps!
Challenges with React Native
As a web developer, I’ve found that working with React Native presents some challenges. The biggest issue for me is that it does not allow for the use of HTML and CSS for markup and styling. These are tools that I am very comfortable with as a web developer, and I find their absence in React Native to be limiting. This limitation is compounded by the fact that React Native cannot be retrofitted onto an existing web application.
React Native cannot be retrofitted onto an existing web application
As a web developer, I often turn to web applications as a quick and efficient way to prototype new ideas. The speed and flexibility of web development allows me to quickly ship an application to a production-like environment for user testing. For example, I recently built a ChatGPT3-powered application in 90 minutes (the 90 minutes is because we were watching a soccer match) to demonstrate the power of the ChatGPT3 API for building AI applications. I don’t think I could build and deploy a native mobile app to the app store as quickly, even with React Native or other native mobile app development technologies. The challenge with React Native is that if I later decide that an idea would be better suited as a mobile app, I would have to start from scratch.
CapacitorJS to the rescue!
If you’ve encountered similar challenges with React Native or other native mobile app development technologies, you might be interested in CapacitorJS, a solution created by the Ionic team. Capacitor is a simple JavaScript library that can be easily dropped into any existing web project to convert it into a mobile app in just a few minutes.
To use Capacitor, you simply follow these steps:
- Drop Capacitor into any existing web app.
- Install the native platforms you want to target (e.g. iOS, Android).
- (Optional) Access core native APIs or extend with your own.
If you want to create a one-to-one replica of your web application as a mobile app, steps 1 and 2 will suffice. And that’s generally all that’s required! Converting your web app into a native mobile app is literally as easy as 123. For more detailed installation instructions and information on the native APIs that you can use with Capacitor, as well as some tutorials and guides, consult the Capacitor documentation.
It’s Not All Roses and Rainbows
While Capacitor is a useful tool for converting web applications to native mobile apps, it may not be the best choice in all cases. In particular, I would not recommend using Capacitor over React Native and Expo if:
- You’re already comfortable with ReactNative and are sure that you’re building a mobile application.
- You are starting from scratch, meaning you won’t need to rewrite your markup and styling to be compliant with React Native, it’ll be compliant from the beginning.
- You are not planning to deploy your app to a production environment in 90 minutes. This means you have time to go through the app store deployment and publishing process.
The reason I would not recommend Capacitor in these scenarios is that, in my experience, React Native is better suited for native mobile app development. Many things that are difficult in web development and require a lot of code, come as defaults in React Native. This results in higher quality (as far as mobile app standards are concerned) and a better developer experience.
In closing
To conclude, it’s important to note that this article is not meant to advocate for the use of Capacitor over React Native, or vice versa. Both tools have their own strengths and are well-suited for different use cases. I am grateful to the Ionic team for creating a powerful tool like Capacitor that allows web developers like myself to quickly and easily convert our web applications into native mobile apps. With Capacitor, we can now offer users the option to access our app through a web browser or download it from the app store.
