🧠 Knowledge Series #24: How are mobile apps built?

Swift, Xcode, iOS and why building mobile apps is different to building web apps

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Hi product people 👋,

For some product teams, building a mobile app is often seen as a natural extension of a company’s value proposition. If there are specific use cases or audience segments that would be better served with a mobile app, then it’s a no-brainer to cater to that. For other companies, the mobile app is the product.

But, building mobile apps isn’t always as straightforward as it seems. And part of this complexity is driven by the sheer number of different choices a team needs to make before they start to build anything: should it be built natively? What OS makes most sense? Should you use React Native?

In this Knowledge Series, we’ll explore how mobile apps are actually built so that if you’re ever deciding how your team should build its own mobile app you’re fully up to speed with the various options and technologies involved.

Coming up:

• The mobile operating system landscape

• The choices a product team needs to make when building a mobile app: Native vs non-native and more

• Differences between mobile apps and the web explained

• How a native mobile app is built on iOS

• Specific terms, tools and technologies worth knowing about

• A real world example to help make sense of apps

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The Knowledge Series

The mobile operating system landscape

Before we delve too deeply into how mobile apps are built, it’s helpful to understand the broader mobile OS landscape since one of the first decisions a product team needs to make is to decide which OS to build for.

Android dominates the global OS market with around 70% market share - however this is declining slightly. It’s down from 72% in January 2023 to just under 70% in 2024. 

Source: Stat Counter

In the US, though, iOS commands 58% of the market which is up slightly year on year.

Source: Stat Counter

But, it’s not just the market share that’s important. Product teams also have to consider the quality of these users - particularly if the app is paid for. As we noted in a previous piece on mobile apps and retention, iOS users tend to spend more on average than Android users, making building on iOS a more attractive proposition for some product teams vs Android.

It goes without saying then, that the decision about which OS to build for, is pretty fundamental. But there are are decisions product teams need to make, too.

Other decisions a product team needs to make

Other decisions product teams need to make in relation to building a mobile app include:

• Should you use React native?

• Should you build an app natively? 

• How will the app fit with your existing web product?

• Should the app use a shared database with your core web platform?

The differences between building apps vs building for the web