React Native for Mobile Application Development: Why Use It?
React Native allows developers to create mobile applications with a rich user interface using only JavaScript. Since it uses the same design as React, the popular JavaScript library created by Facebook, it offers the same declarative components as React. What are some advantages of creating mobile applications in React Native?
Cross Platform Development
React Native offers the ease and convenience of developing both iOS and Android mobile applications with one codebase. Instead of attempting to develop an iOS version of your application in Swift and an Android version in Java, you can save the precious time and effort wasted on writing and maintaining two separate codebases to accomplish the same thing. Build out your new application features instead!
Hot Reloading
In an effort to enhance the developer experience, React Native introduced hot reloading to minimize the time that it takes for a mobile user interface to reflect changes made from the moment the developer saves changes made to his or her files. This is made possible by using JavaScript (thanks to its shorter compile time), implementing a tool called a Packager (transforms ES6/JSX files into normal JavaScript so that the virtual machine can understand it, and keeps state for fast, incremental changes), and a feature called Live Reload. Hot reloading allows you to build your application faster instead of recompiling with each code change.
Reuse Skills
Since React Native is an extension of React, web developers can easily get started with mobile application development without learning an entirely new language (or two, if developing for both platforms). Since React Native uses JavaScript, state, and component lifecycle methods just like those in React, React developers can take the skills and concepts previously learned and apply them to build mobile applications.
Flexibility
Although it may be easy to build mobile application components with React Native, what if you have a preexisting application with mobile components already? No problem! React Native can be easily combined with components written in Swift or Java, offering the flexibility to implement React Native components as they are needed along with other components. This allows developers to save time on application rewriting or optimize a few parts of your application.
React Native is a great option for those venturing into the world of mobile application development, but it may not be the right choice for everyone! The fact that JavaScript does not guarantee accuracy with decimal numbers, for example, may present problems in applications that rely heavily on decimal computation. For applications with different focuses, however, React Native can be just the tool needed to hit the ground running with the next best mobile application.
