Flutter App Development: 4 Distinct Pros and Cons of the Framework
The names such as Google Pay or Alibaba are all too familiar for netizens across the world. But only a few of you would know the application development framework that powers these successful apps. Yes, we’re talking about Flutter.
This popular framework developed by Google was officially launched in December 2018. Since then, it didn’t take Flutter too long to gain immense recognition. In May 2020, the third generation of Flutter was released with upgrades that offer better experience for developers and users alike.
This post will deep dive into the advantages and disadvantages of using Flutter framework to develop robust mobile applications.
Flutter- At A Glance
The framework is an open-source technology created by Google for building mobile, desktop, and web apps with a single codebase. Unlike other recognized frameworks, Flutter isn’t simply a framework, It’s a complete Software Development Kit (SDK).
The Flutter SDK consists of everything from a User Interface library to a rendering engine and tooling to develop robust mobile applications. This means Flutter doesn’t rely on other tools to build mobile apps.
Flutter is primarily known as a framework because that’s the area of development application engineers target when developing different apps.
Pros of Utilizing Flutter for Mobile App Development
1. Faster Mobile Application Development
One of the major reasons to opt for Flutter over other frameworks is that the platform reduces the time-to-market, lowers engineering resources, and minimises app development costs drastically. Flutter presents a single codebase to develop both Android and iOS apps.
In its latest version, Flutter has shifted support for building Windows, macOS, Linux, and the web into stable channels. The expansion of its cross-platform support has enabled Flutter to create even wider opportunities for cross- platform consistency and cost savings.
2. The Ease of Complete Customization
Google has focused on customisation and style as core elements of the Flutter platform, keeping in consideration that app design is crucial to succeed in the marketplace.
Flutter allows for complete control over the look and feel of its deployed applications. It comes with built-in widgets tailored to the ecosystem they’re deployed in. The framework is known to provide control over every pixel of the screen, and it holds true in the extensively customised Flutter apps available in the market.
The advantages of Flutter’s approach to User Interface becomes prominent when targeting diverse platforms, screens, sizes, and devices with a single codebase. In many cases, this framework is capable of things that most frameworks can’t compete with.
3. Enhanced Development Support
As Flutter evolved over the years, the tools created to support developers have improved exponentially. One such crucial feature known as “hot reload”, makes it possible to see the effects of minute changes in code with almost-instant “just in time compilation.
Hot reload makes developers’ jobs easier, by making the processes of conducting detailed investigation and bug fixes simple and quick. It’s one of the prominent developer tools which help maintain the quality and reliability of the final production of the application.
Similar improvements have also been witnessed in the documentation created to support the developers. Flutter’s comprises some of the most in-depth learning resources and platform documentation to help new developers get up to speed with how it works.
4. Consistent High-performance
There are many factors to assess an app’s performance: Central Processing Unit (CPU) usage, average response time, number of requests per second, and more. The flutter framework promises a consistent 60 fps (or 120fps performance on various devices capable of 120Hz updates), which is the rate at which modern screens display a smooth picture.
To make things even better, the latest update of Flutter 3 introduced an algorithm that predicts the complexity of the picture rendering. This detail is used to optimise the memory usage without compromising the Flutter app performance.
Cons of Choosing Flutter for Mobile App Development
As with any technology, Flutter too is not without its set of shortcomings. Let’s delve into some of them for a better understanding.
1. A Relatively New Platform
Even though Flutter is rapidly evolving, it’s still a relatively new platform. This automatically indicates that developers haven’t had enough time exploring this framework to build many years and experience and produce plenty of sophisticated mobile applications. Many of Flutter’s supporting libraries and tools are still in an early stage of development.
While Flutter is being developed and upgraded with remarkable pace and skill, it may still take some time before it draws in a large pool of Flutter developers and engineers.
2. Lack of Third-Party Libraries
Third-party libraries and packages play a significant role in automating application development and eliminating the need to code everything from scratch. These libraries are essentially open-source and easily available.
For many older and popular technologies, finding the required package isn’t a huge issue, as opposed to the newer technologies. However, Flutter so far consists of 25k+ packages on Flutter’s official resource and the numer’s on the sharp rise. Even though it’s less than its main competitor, React Native, it’s sufficient for now. Additionally, Flutter widgets allow for covering most of the development cycle without any third-party tools.
3. A Significant Style Departure
There’s no denying that Flutter’s ability to render its own component does lead to some of its greatest advantages. However, it also causes Flutter apps to depart from the expected look and feel, particularly on mobile platforms.
Flutter utilises Google’s Material Design on Android apps and Cupertino design on iOS platforms. These offer elements that are consistent with the platform they run on, but distinct enough to be noticeable when compared to non-Flutter apps. If strict consistency, between Flutter and non-Flutter apps, is a priority then this could pose a serious problem.
4. App Size is a Concern
Users tend to have limited storage on their phones, so it’s preferable to release apps that they won’t be forced to delete in favour of precious photos or videos. To reduce the program size, developers often avoid animations, compress images, and bring the number of packages and libraries to a minimum.
Since Flutter comes with built-in widgets, a minimum app size exceeds 4MB, which is bigger than native Java (539KB) and Kotlin (550KB) apps. In all fairness, its competitors share the same problem. For instance, the released version in Xamarin takes almost 16MB and React Native takes up 7MB.
Final Thoughts
As we weigh in on the advantages and disadvantages, it’s evident that Flutter is a convenient choice for developers to build high-performing applications for the future. That said, it’s imperative to consider the disadvantages of Flutter to ensure it aligns with the specific requirements of developing mobile apps for businesses.