Over a decade, the mobile industry has witnessed many changes and tremendous growth. Especially in the past 5 years, the number of smartphone users on the global level has reached 45% of the total population. As per Statista, the number is supposed to reach 50 billion the mark in 2020.
Mobile phones work on three major platforms such as iOS, Android, and Windows(that is losing the mark). With this comes the comparison between the frameworks such as Flutter Vs Xamarin for cross-platform mobile app development.
Why Opt For Cross-Platform App Development?
The reason to choose between Flutter and Xamarin mobile development frameworks was due to the shortcoming of traditional native mobile app development. The native apps are extremely expensive and slow. Not only this but the coding is done separately for different platforms.
This requires a toolkit and a development team with specific skill sets for every platform which can be time-consuming and costly. This makes mobile app development companies go for cross-platform apps. A single code can help in developing the app for different platforms.
Cross-platform app development helps in managing time, reaching more users, and retaining maintenance costs. However, it is not easy to dive into cross-platform apps since the development can be done based on different frameworks such as Xamarin, Flutter, XDK, and Cordova.
Flutter Vs Xamarin are the two major frameworks that iOS and Android app developers opt for. The frameworks have their own set of pros and cons that makes them ideal for development.
Before going for the Xamarin Vs Flutter, let us understand the frameworks.
What is Flutter?
Flutter is the major framework that is used for the development of cross-platform apps. Created in 2017 It is open-source in nature that is the development by Google. The framework is majorly famous for front-end development.
Advantages of Flutter:
- It is customizable due to pre-built widgets with an extensive library.
- Flutter framework is famous to have a complete development ecosystem including CLI tools, pre-built widgets, and other major tools.
- It has the feature of a hot reload that helps in fixing bugs while implementation of code.
- Google-owned Flutter is reliable due to brand support.
Disadvantages of Flutter:
Flutter supports only limited Native APIs that make developers go for third-party packages.
- The apps developed on Flutter are larger due to the packages used and other libraries modes.
What is Xamarin?
Xamarin is a cross-platform app framework that is open-source in nature and is the oldest language founded in 2011.
Advantages of Xamarin:
- Xamarin apps are famous for native-like performance.
- The Xamarin.Forms offer a seamless user experience due to standard interface elements due to the template library.
- For small teams, Xamarin is free.
- Xamarin helps in developing mobile apps with a complete development ecosystem such as Microsoft Visual Studio, NEt, and C#.
Disadvantages of Xamarin:
- Xamarin apps are larger than native apps due to the libraries of C# development.
- The new updates and features of Xamarin are reflected in the tool after a delay.
- The code must be written as platform-specific in some UI elements.
- Xamarin works well with simple UI but with the complex app, it depends on heavy graphics that affect the speed of the app.
Flutter Vs Xamarin – What To Use?
Xamarin and Flutter are used for the development of cross-platform apps that use a single code. Google-owned Flutter app development framework was introduced in the market in 2015 with the topmost platform – Dart.
Whereas Xamarin, founded in 2011 uses Microsoft .NET platforms to develop the apps using Visual Studio IDE integration. Both platforms have different aspects in the market that make them ideal for use. To make it easy to understand the difference, here are the essential points.
- Programming Language
- Portability
- Access to Native OS
- Community Support
- Price
- App Size
- UI Component
#1 Programming Language
Is Flutter faster than Xamarin? This is something many developers ask. Let us understand the aspect of programming language to understand it in a better way.
Xamarin and Flutter are the two major programming languages that are used for cross-platform app development. The major reason is the ability to develop apps over different programming languages while integrating the respective Flutter and Xamarin mobile development frameworks.
The data-based framework – Flutter – is a famous platform for Java developers. The object-oriented concepts are easy to understand with Dart syntax to develop apps that are easy-to-follow documentation. Dart has a set of amazing features that can be used in app development.
Whereas Xamarin depends upon C# to develop cross-platform apps. However, Microsoft C# is a famous language with large community support that makes it ideal for developers. Xamarin can easily integrate the .NET tools that make it easy to use as a functional, metaprogramming, and portable language.
#2 Portability
Even though the Windows Operating System for mobile apps is no longer used by users, Xamarin still offers support along with iOS and Android. Whereas Flutter is entirely focused on the iOS and Android apps that give Xamarin an advantage.
To understand Flutter Vs Xamarin, it is best to know about the overall setup as well.
Flutter apps are not portable for the Windows platform but it is not counted much since Windows OS is not a priority for mobile app development. Whereas Xamarin is used to develop apps for iOS and Android platforms.
The Windows-less Flutter development is not considered a huge shortcoming since the majority of users are on iOS and Android. In addition to this, with 32-bit OS devices, Flutter is incompatible which makes Xamarin developers a good choice for the apps for iPhone 5 and less version.
#3 Access to Native OS
Flutter is built with the help of Dart programming language which makes it easy to compile with Ahead of Time (AOT). it is an advantage of Flutter over Xamarin.
However, Dart Virtual Machine (VM) is essential for compiling AOT with Flutter. This is important due to the unsupported feature of the iOS platform for dynamic or JIT compilation.
Flutter can access APIs and services of different platforms for sensors and storage packages. The platform channels can be implemented with the help of Flutter Libraries.
Whereas, the Flutter Vs Xamarin Native OS is different when it comes to Xamarin. The machine code compilation is done with the C# code followed by packed-in. app.
To compile the native platform code, intermediary machine code integration is accomplished. This is done for iOS app compilation with AOT and Xamarin.Android apps with jiT compilation.
#4 Community Support
The interest of developers plays a vital role in the popularity of the respective technology. They start to share information, knowledge, and crisp code of the platforms forming a community. This community helps the developers to solve any issue soon and learn something new regarding the specific platform.
Xamarin is a framework that integrates with C#. it is a Microsoft-based platform that is considered a large community platform. This means that any proposals, issues, or problems can be discussed among the people included in the community setting.
The mobile app development company even participates in the conference to understand Xamarin in a better way. In addition to this, it is the oldest framework that is used for cross-platform app development. That is another reason that developers use it more.
Whereas, Flutter Vs Xamarin, is different. Flutter has gained a lot of popularity over time but it is nowhere near the popularity of Xamarin. It is rapidly growing with time but with limited support, the issues are not solved easily.
#5 Price
Xamarin is a product that is free for a small team or individual. Otherwise, Visual Studio follows the subscription model with the renewal charge on an annual basis. It has VS Professional, VR Enterprise, etc. models that can be linked together.
Flutter is an open-source and free platform that doesn’t charge anything from the development team or companies. It is another advantage of Flutter over Xamarin that makes it a good choice.
#6 App Size
The app size holds a lot of importance in the app development world. It includes a large size that covers up a lot of space over the disk. This is something that a user never appreciates. Hence, it is best to be aware of the total app size before diving into the development world.
Xamarin is an ideal choice because of the binary-like size of the app. It is a bit bigger as per the release bundle. The performance optimization and code are not done before launching it over app stores.
Flutter follows a different story since it is bigger in binary size for Android and iOS apps. However, the framework can be a bit heavy for the mobile phone. The Flutter and Xamarin mobile development frameworks depend widely on the app size which makes developers keep it a priority.
#7 UI Component
The native components support is the major part of cross-platform app development. The API is essential to allow mobile apps to access the native modules easily.
With Xamarin app development, cross-platform development APIs are used for solid documentation. This helps in supporting different platforms including tvOS, watchOS, macOS, Forms, Android, and iOS.
This has a lot of UI modules and components that help in developing buttons, layouts, databases, and pop-ups. This has a direct impact on the Xamarin vs Flutter performance.
Whereas with Flutter, UI rendering components are the major part of stateful management, testing, navigation, API access, and libraries. The Flutter frameworks are added to develop the app along with Cupertino and Material Design which helps in UI rendering.
Compare – Flutter Vs Xamarin
Conclusion
These are the key differences between Flutter Vs Xamarin that define the use of these frameworks in a detailed way. However, it is best to be aware of all the major components while choosing the best out of both.
These components are going to be part of future development helping the community to set out the development of projects.
Flutter vs Xamarin Cross-Platform Mobile Development are extensively used for apps to develop native-like features. There is no doubt that Xamarin is famous due to market trust but Flutter is slowly gaining speed in the development world.
What are your opinions, “Is flutter better than Xamarin?” or “Is Xamarin going to rule for a long time?”.
sitaram
Chief Technology Officer
