7 Ways to Speed up Your Mobile App Development

Creating a mobile app is time-consuming. That’s certainly the impression you get when you read most of the articles and case studies on the topic. Approximate deadlines generally tend to be the same everywhere - about two to four months. And that’s just for products with relatively modest user functionality. For example, the Microsoft Office mobile app was worked on for nearly three years.

A single person created the Yo app in just 8 hours and it took Microsoft 3 years to release Office for iPad

But there are examples where minimal effort has yielded impressive results. So, the Yo app was created by one person in 8 hours (attracted 1 million dollars in investments and made the top 10 list for most popular apps in the App Store).

Let's find out what factors affect development time and how to save time at each phase.

1. Spending an extra week on research will save you a month on creation

Phases of research for a prospective app:

1. Discussing the idea with various people to test its viability
2. Defining the target audience; the age and interests of users
3. Examining similar apps and identifying their pros and cons
4. Creating a list of features and highlighting 1 or 2 of the most valuable
5. Predict total development time based on the feature list
6. Choose appropriate technologies for development

2. It is faster to develop an app with standard UI elements

In UI design, your purpose is to help the user accomplish their goals. The easier your UI is to understand, the better it can fulfill its purpose.

When you reinvent the wheel, you not only run the risk of creating an uglier interface. You also force the user to learn a new design pattern. This adds unnecessary processing time.

3. Save 30% of your time with a cross-platform tool

An interface is created separately for each platform, and the creation time for different platforms is approximately the same, meaning production time will double if you need to create versions for Android and iOS. By choosing a cross-platform tool, you will save up to 30% of the total development time.

4. Development time can be reduced by 40% using turnkey backend infrastructure (BaaS)

If you don't have any experience in backend development, check out ready-made solutions like Google Firebase or Amazon AWS Amplify. These platforms will significantly reduce the time needed to develop the server side and they can withstand any workload or number of users

5. Accelerate app development with MVP techniques

You can reduce the development and release time of your app by using a minimum viable product (MVP) methodology. The point of the method is simple: instead of implementing all the functions of an app, focus on the single most important function. This will allow you to create and release a working app as quickly as possible, creating immediate value for the user.

6. Testing on real devices

If you do not have the device you need for testing, use a service that offers remote access to real mobile devices.
A list of services where you can test an app on real devices:

• AWS Device Farm (1000 minutes for free) - https://aws.amazon.com/device-farm/
• Saucelabs (160 minutes for free) - https://saucelabs.com/
• BrowserStack (30 minutes free) - https://www.browserstack.com/

7. Knowing the root causes of app rejection can save you a week or more

The most common reasons app are rejected:

1. Crashes and errors in the app
2. Broken links in the app description
3. Lack of requests for permission to use sensitive data (geolocation, camera, etc.)
4. Inaccurate screenshots or their absence in the app description
5. Incomplete information that makes it difficult for the store employee to test
6. A non-standard user interface that makes it difficult to work with the app
7. Your app is just a website opening in a browser
8. Re-publishing a similar app
9. Misleading the user in any way
10. Insufficient usefulness

If you want to learn more details, read our full blog article on How long does it take to create a mobile app