Hybrid vs Native Mobile Apps

One question routinely surfaces in today’s modern development landscape—whether to build a native app versus a hybrid app. As a developer, you need to take the time to think through a few considerations before running off to develop software.

Hybrid is still a web app that runs in a native web browser view. It lets us utilize HTML5, CSS, JQuery, Sencha etc.

Hybrid simply pushes web browser control in the core language and then launches the URL. 

A native application is an application program that has been developed for use on a particular platform or device. Because native apps are written for a specific platform, they can interact with and take advantage of operating system features and other software that is typically installed on that platform. Because a native app is built for a particular device and its operating system

Disadvantages of Hybrid Apps:

• The applications are web applications inside a web-view.
• Browser performance and the UI quality does not come close to the native application component performance.
• Not all device APIs would be available for the applications. There are lots of limitations in exploring some OS features – including file system access, accessing resources like phone, camera and external devices.

We should choose Hybrid when:

• For small size application that just need to show up the content without requiring to use native components.
• For a simple architecture & stability and platform independent. 
• Even fits well for mid-level applications, but depends on the need. 

We should use native code when:

• For enterprise architecture and there is need of use of native components with powerful data structure handling and a lot of depth.
• For apps with rich user interfaces and/or heavy graphics.
• For apps requiring the best performance and UI quality.
• For apps requiring utilizing full benefits provided by OSs. 

One has to agree that the major disadvantage with native code is stability concerns. Whenever new versions of iOS, Android gets released, one has to spend time learning new features, deprecated APIs and fix as needed in existing apps and release new versions. With iOS its still better, as Apple releases one or two versions in a year. But with Android its getting worse!

Each way of designing and building apps comes with its own set of benefits and drawbacks. Both native and hybrid are ways to fulfill the different needs and preferences of users and developers, and none of them can be thought as a perfect solution. They have their strengths and weaknesses and it is up to you to decide which of them fits you better and which one you will use in your application.