In recent years, the comparison between Flutter and React Native has become a common topic of discussion among developers. Both are prevalent multi-platform tools for faster and hassle-free mobile application development.
If you ever visit a developer meetup and ask the question, "What should I pick, Flutter or React Native?" you're setting the stage for a very spirited debate.
This blog post outlines the head-to-toe comparison of Flutter vs. React Native in detail.
What is Flutter?
Flutter is a user interface (UI) software development kit released by Google in 2018. Flutter lets you build cross-platform applications for a number of platforms.
What is React Native?
React Native is a mobile development framework created by Facebook and released in 2015. You can use React Native to develop a cross-platform app that runs on mobile, web, and desktop.
Pros and Cons of Flutter
To make the most out of technology, You must know both its strengths and weaknesses. The same stands true when it comes to Flutter.
So, let's take a look at the pros and cons of Flutter one by one.
Pros of Flutter
Hot Reload
This is probably one of the most application-friendly features of Flutter that directly speed up the development process. The hot reloading feature allows changes done within the source code to be visible in the app in real-time.
Thus, whether you are building an application right from scratch or adding new elements to it, you can experience the changes within the application in the run time. Also, this component comes in handy when you are detecting and eliminating the bugs from your Flutter application.
Open-Source
Flutter is an open-source platform that allows visibility of the changes introduced to its source code. If you know the programming languages used in the development of Flutter, you can understand its works by analyzing its source code.
In the above context, freely available implies that any individual and business can use Flutter to create applications without paying anything for the platform.
Detailed Documentation
Creating documentation for any open-source technology plays a crucial role. It enables individuals to understand and leverage the features offered by the technology. When talking about Flutter, its documentation proves beneficial as it covers almost everything that you need to begin developing best-in-class Flutter applications.
Also, you can find several special use cases of Flutter shared through Git repositories.
Cons of Flutter
Bulky Applications
While the applications built with Flutter are fast and offer smooth performance, the bulky storage size of the app remains a concern. It takes more time to download these applications. Also, the large project size becomes a challenge for developers.
Difficulty in Maintaining Code
This is something that you as a developer may find quite frustrating. As Flutter, as well as Dart, are undergoing dynamic evolution, you will witness some updates that may hamper the functionality of your applications. Thus, you need to be extra attentive to identify and rectify any odd behavior of your Flutter applications after the release of a major update.
Pros of React Native
Faster Development
React Native incorporates various components that ensure faster application development, such as and . Although React is also a new framework, JavaScript has an ample package library, which comes in handy when you need to build custom components.
Also, React Native can use for web and ReactXP libraries for building web applications. Overall, this framework lets developers create comprehensive functional applications in a short period.
High-Performance Applications With Compelling UIs
The React Native code runs as quickly as native code, so the applications can perform extremely well. No need to mention that while creating complex applications, the React Native code can become a little slow.
However, you have the option to build and deploy some native modules to eliminate the performance issues.
When it comes to the UI or user interface, React Native rigorously supports the development of UIs that are interactive and compelling.
Cons of React Native
Difficult to debug
Mobile app development done on React Native platform is challenging to debug. Furthermore, the debugging process becomes highly tedious as these applications are created using Java, C/C++, and JavaScript.
Another concern with React Native is that it continually goes backward and forward between the thread of JavaScript and the Native environment. Therefore, it is critical for React Native app developers to ensure integration with Flipper to overcome this issue, a tool that can support the debugging process.
Hard to determine the user interface
If your mobile app needs components such as animations, multiple screen transitions, and interactions, choosing React Native for app development might not be recommended. Mobile apps with complex gestures are not developed using React Native.
Although there is a solution to this issue, React Native incorporates a gesture responder system. Therefore, it will run the entire lifecycle of all the gestures in the mobile applications. However, the developers will still face some complications with complex ones. This is because Android and iOS apps have a suitable API that differs entirely from each other.
Flutter vs. React Native: Head-to-Toe Comparison
So, how to choose between Flutter vs. React Native? We have outlined a quick reference for you to compare the two below:
The table element
| Technology | React Native | Flutter |
|---|---|---|
| First Release | Jan 2015 | May 2017 |
| Created By | ||
| Performance | Slower performance because of JavaScript bridging | High-performing, quick |
| Adaptive Components | Some are adaptive automatically | Components aren’t adaptive. Need to be configured manually. |
| Learning Curve | Easy to pick up, especially if you are used to React or Javascript before | Quite steep, you need to pick up Dart, and reactive programming isn’t all intuitive |
| Main Architecture | Flux and Redux | BLoC |
| Ecosystem | Quite Mature, used in production in many big companies around the world, many packages available | Not yet mature, a fewer number of packages |
| Hot Reload | Supported | Supported |
the entire lifecycle of all the gestures in the mobile applications. However, the developers will still face some complications with complex ones. This is because Android and iOS apps have a suitable API that differs entirely from each other.
The Future of Flutter and React Native
In recent years, a significant improvement has been made to both frameworks, mainly due to updates made in 2019 and 2020.
For instance, Flutter launched its version 2.8 a few months ago at the end of 2021, which incorporates features such as
- Reduction in startup latency (50% for low-end devices and 10% for high-end)
- Enhanced ecosystem
- New Enhanced Tracing feature
- Improving memory footprint and Dart VM;
- Improved web platforms views and performance
- And much more
- When it comes to React Native, they have great news to share, as well. In their updated version 17.0.2, they’ve added improvements, such as
- Fast Refresh, which is a combination of their hot reloading features;
- Added Window Dimensions Hook;
- Fixes for frameworks! CocoaPods support;
- They’ve also declared a push to make APIs stable, build a better GitHub Repository, enhance documentation, clean up their surface area, and introduce support tools in the open-source community.
The Final Verdict
The above comparison shows that Flutter and React Native have several common features. Firstly, they both are open-source frameworks that anyone can use. Renowned enterprises develop them both: React Facebook designed native. vs. Google created Flutter.
At present, React Native supports Android 4.1+ and iOS 10+, while Flutter supports Android 4.1+ or iOS 8+.
Overall, Flutter and React Native are great choices to optimize time and resources on mobile app development cost-efficiently. But, of course, what framework to choose will depend on several factors such as application type, features, app complexity, and budget to hire React Native or Flutter app developers.
Top comments (1)
Great insights on Flutter vs React Native. To delve deeper into these frameworks, check out our company's recent article "Flutter vs. React Native: Which Framework Wins in 2023?". It provides additional perspectives on the subject that you might find beneficial.