For a developer looking to create the same app on all the mobile platforms such as iOS, Android, Windows, and etc. it might seem like too much work to design a native app from scratch for every single OS.  In order to be able to quickly make the same app for multiple platforms, cross platform development has been a popular trend for some.  This is the concept where developers can build an app once, and run it on all OS.  There are various frameworks a developer can use to create cross platform mobile apps such as Phonegap, and Titanium.  Although this seems like the best and easiest way to create apps, there are various pros and cons about cross platform applications vs. native applications.  A developer should know the advantages and limitations when choosing between the two types of applications.

 

 

PROS:

 

• First it’s obvious that developing an app once and launching it on multiple OS is very efficient and a lot faster.

 

• Besides from the quickness, cross platform applications only require the developer to know HTML5, Javascript, and CSS3 to build apps.  The need to learn how to program for each OS becomes unnecessary.

 

• Testing becomes much faster and launching the app will certainly come a lot sooner than creating multiple native apps.

 

• A developer will be able to use the common hardware features on every mobile device and still have the UI specific for each OS platform.

 

CONS:

 

• Although faster, cross platform applications have shown much less performance quality than native applications.

 

• It is highly likely that cross platform apps will require a connection in order to be started, whereas native applications may not require a connection.

 

• The use of specific hardware that is not shared by multiple mobile OS is harder to make use of with cross platform applications.  So in general cross platform applications will have a limited access to Hardware features.

 

• There are plenty of plug-ins with cross platform frameworks, but if there isn’t one then a developer must create one from scratch.

 

It is not recommended that developers create cross platform applications just because it is easier.  Deciding between the two involves knowing what you want your app to do and fulfill, who are the users, will the app require hardware that is uncommon in different devices.  So whether to use cross platform applications or native applications is up to the developers.