Flutter vs. React Native – What to Choose in 2021?

Do you ever plan on choosing a platform for your mobile application which must be efficient without the overhead of the code structure and the time of consumption and resources requirement? Every factor must be covered when planning to invest in the right app using the top application frameworks. Cross-platform is leading 2021 over the market while still few app and developers are struggling to choose the native app over cross-platform. Both the frameworks have their benefits and limitations at the same time, developers have a choice to understand their app demand and invest over the right framework as per considering the important differences between them. 

This blog helps you in covering the most important and often asked question: what to choose in 2021 as a cross-platform app development framework. Comparison between both flutter and react native and how they are different from each other?

First, let's understand what is flutter and react native and their percentage rule over the market.

What is Flutter and React Native:

Flutter and react-native are the market players in cross-platform development frameworks. Both are the frameworks used for building mobile applications for the android and iOS platforms. The initial release of flutter is in 2017 by Google and react native is initially released in 2015 by Facebook under the open-source project. Both are very powerful and very feature-rich and open source. They both support the single code base for cross operating systems to ensure fast coding and bug fixing. 

Market share for React Native and Flutter:

Over one-third of the mobile app developers are using the cross-platform application instead of native app frameworks. At recent market share for the react native is around 11% and business and industries and 10% for others. React native also has a wider range of developers of around 50 million while Flutter consists of having 10 million monthly active users.

As per the stats, flutter and react-native contribution in the market of top development sites is:

• Stackoverflow: 68% for flutter and 57% for react native
• Github: 13k contributors for flutter and 9k for react-native
• Google Trends: 85 queries for flutter and 60 for react-native

Apps built by Flutter: 

• Google Ads: Use to show the google ad campaign statics on the device.
• Alibaba: E-Commerce app used by the users for shopping through their device.
• Birch Finance: It's a fintech app developed to manage your personal credit card.
• Reflect: Lifestyle app

Apps built by React Native:

• Facebook: the best platform for social sharing
• Instagram: a platform for the exchange of the photo
• SoundCloud Pulse: an open-source platform for music sharing
• Bloomberg: related to global business and stock market and finance.

Tips: React Native= faster development - open source - easy to market - rapid approach.

Comparison Between Flutter and React Native:

• Performance:  Flutter is faster in performance while in a react native environment the developer needs to interact with the additional libraries. Flutter uses the dart language for faster performance which makes it versatile to handle many issues and gives an amazing user experience. Memory usage of the flutter is 50% more than the react native framework. The CPU performance in flutter is high as compared to the react-native.
• Programming Language: Flutter is using the dart language and reacts native is using javascript. Flutter uses the inbuilt components and react native uses the third-party libraries. Flutter is used in creating the apps more frequently.
• Architecture: Architecture comprises various factors like speed, quality of the product, and the possibility to solve tasks. Flutter is mainly for designing the user interface. It has a flutter UI library. While react native is using the JavaScript search engine. It resembles the native applications. But as a result, the performance degrades due to delay in interpreting the JavaScript code when the application is running.
• Development and Code: The flutter framework has an environment in which the code can maintain easily. Flutter provides the super-fast loading feature for making the changes faster as compared to the react-native environment. While in react native the code debugging is quite offensive literally. It slows down the overall performance of the app using the native third-party libraries. They consistently require maintenance and impact the improvement in the performance.
• Documentation and Execution: Flutter has richer documentation compared to the react-native. Its documentation is mainly focused on describing the complicated process. For the deployment of the app, Flutter wins the race and one can easily develop and deploy the app on the play store of google or apple. Third-party solutions are available.

• Development Cost: For any cross-platform development of the app you have to first make the choice between the top 2 frameworks flutter or react native. Once you have chosen it the next step is to estimate the total cost for its development. Cost estimation is merely based on many factors like engagement model and demographics or location of the developer and team formation and how fast the development rate with the lowest error rate reduces the bug fixation rate, etc. So it's the most important aspect of building the app.

Tips: Flutter = Fast development- quick rendering- cross-platform- open source and free- fast reloading. 

Flutter is the next future?

Flutter is best known for having a wide range of contributors helpful for the development and its monthly improvements and updates are there for the better engagement of the community for help and support. That is the main reason why companies are switching towards the flutter. 

Insights from the Flutter Developers

Flutter was harder to learn than react native. 

The components of the react-native are very simple so the developer can easily able to manage the style functionality and able to do the changes. As in terms of performance, the flutter had won the game due to its fast arm processor speed and use of 32-bit native libraries which makes it very fast to execute. 

Conclusion:

Both the react native and flutter reduce the cost and time to market. Speedy performance reduces the cost of the project. The main benefit of a flutter over react native is the lack of platform constraints. Flutter renders everything by itself. 

So if you are the developer for using JavaScript and build the GUI using the UI components then react native is the best choice for you. If brand designing is your priority then flutter should be your choice. 

If you are in doubt and not find out the solution then you can hire a flutter app developer who can help you in choosing the right app development for your project.