It’s no secret that users are becoming accustomed to a digital world which offers reliable, fast, and engaging platforms across all devices, all networks, and all applications. This is where PWAs, or Progressive Web Apps, comes in, and alters the way web applications are developed. PWAs combine the characteristics of a mobile app and a traditional website.
What are PWAs?
Web users should be familiar with Progressive Web Apps because they focus on delivering the same experience that users get from mobile apps, thanks to their built-in app structure. They must be interlinked with the core function of browsing as they execute it inside a web browser, they can also be added on a users home screen and works with offline capabilities, and push notifications, all without the use of an app.
Key Features of PWAs
- Offline Functionality
How best to describe it, this is due to the use of service workers, PWAs are able to cache content and even perform basic operations while offline. - App-Like Experience
There are no changes made in the app development, thanks to using responsive design with smooth and transitioning interface, they felt more like native apps than mobile apps. - Fast Loading Speeds
As mentioned above, with the capability of network support: caching methods allows the loading to be instantaneous of various applications. - Cross-Platform Compatibility
A Progressive Web App (PWA) is designed in a way that is responsive and can work on desktops and smartphones. - No Installation Hassle
The addition of a PWA is much more efficient as it doesn’t request for app store download, rather the PWA can be simply added on a home screen from the browsed page itself.
Progressive WebApps are the future.
- Low Accomplishment: Though PWAs are designed considering users from different regions who use varied devices, the application is only developed once which makes cost a lot lower in comparison to native apps that have to be designed for iOS and Android separately.
- Less Effort, more Reach: Users don’t get overstimulated with useless updates yet remain connected with the app thanks to push notifications.
- Further presence: No segregation is there among different PWAs which mainly allow access to them through their app stores, because PWAs are available through search engines.
- No affect on performance: Minimum resource is consumed on PWAs which makes this an excellent device adaptable across any user trying to connect in volatile internet space.
- Proven Successes:
- Twitter brought forward quite unbelievably a PWA version that lowered engagement costs by 70% and at the same time increased user engagement quite astonishingly.
- Starbucks remains offline yet further access users in the add-on being only 99.84 KB, allowing more access to users with a weaker data connection.
- After Flipkart PWA conversions are said to have increased by 70% along with re-engagement increasing by 40%.
- PWA have a few drawbacks such as restricted hardware access for iOS users and the transition towards a service worker that is unfortunately quite slow, however as browser support continues to increase and a wider web ecosystem evolves PWA’s are well set up to take over mobile development of the future.