6 Best Cross-Platform App Development Frameworks for Building Powerful Apps

Cross-platform app development has revolutionized the way we build apps by allowing developers to use a single codebase across multiple platforms. This saves businesses time, cuts costs, and ensures faster releases.

If you’re aiming to develop a powerful, user-friendly app with efficiency and performance, choosing the right tech stack is key. In this article, we’ll explore the top six technologies in the cross-platform landscape, along with their strengths and weaknesses, and go through the main factors that should influence your choice.

Best cross-platform app development frameworks

1. Flutter

Flutter is an open-source UI toolkit originated from Google that empowers developers to create high-quality mobile, web, and desktop apps from a single codebase. It’s celebrated for its ability to deliver native-like performance with visually engaging designs. The Flutter framework uses the Dart programming language and provides a rich set of customizable widgets that mimic the look and feel of native components, resulting in smooth experiences that users expect and are familiar with.

Flutter features

• High performance with native compilation: Flutter is known for its amazing performance. It compiles directly into native code without the need for a JavaScript bridge like React Native, which makes apps built with Flutter fast and on par with native ones. All in all, Flutter applications run smoothly with high FPS, delivering experiences similar to native applications.
• Customizable widgets: Flutter boasts an extensive library of customizable widgets designed to work on both iOS and Android. These widgets allow developers to build custom, branded user interfaces that are responsive and consistent across platforms. Because they are fully customizable, Flutter widgets can mimic native UI or take on a completely unique design.
• Hot reload: Flutter’s hot reload feature enables developers to see code changes instantly in real-time, without having to restart the application. This speeds up the development process by reducing the time spent waiting for updates to take effect, making it easier to refine and experiment with UI elements as you go.

Advantages of Flutter

• Unified codebase for multi-platform deployment: By enabling developers to share one codebase across Android, iOS, web, and desktop, Flutter minimizes development time and resources. This makes it possible to launch applications faster and at a lower cost, a crucial Flutter advantage for startups and large companies alike. 
• Exceptional UI & animation possibilities: Flutter’s rendering engine allows developers to create high-quality animations and complex UIs without compromising performance. Whether it's rich media or custom animations, Flutter handles it smoothly, making it an ideal choice for developing cross-platform apps with high visual requirements. 
• Strong ecosystem: With Google actively developing and investing in Flutter, you get the confidence of a powerful, well-supported framework – Google has even chosen Flutter for its flagship apps, showcasing its commitment to the technology’s future. Frequent updates mean continuous improvement, keeping Flutter app development at the forefront of the cross-platform landscape.
• Engaged community: Flutter’s robust community is a major advantage, offering extensive support, resources, and tools to accelerate development. With developers worldwide contributing to its growth, you’ll find countless plugins, libraries, and solutions for almost any challenge. This active community ensures that best practices, answers, and fresh ideas are always within reach, making Flutter a dynamic and reliable choice for cross-platform development.

Disadvantages of Flutter

• Need for upskilling: Although Dart is a powerful language, it may require a learning curve for developers who are more familiar with other languages like JavaScript or Swift. That said, many developers find Dart’s syntax straightforward and easy to adopt, especially through Flutter training sessions. 
• Senior developers are hard to find: One current drawback with Flutter is the relatively limited availability of experienced senior developers. This can lead to challenges in hiring highly skilled developers, particularly for complex projects requiring in-depth expertise. However, as the demand for senior Flutter app developers has surged in recent years, the talent pool has also grown significantly. 
• Lack of SEO support for Flutter for Web. If you are considering using Flutter just to build a highly indexable webpage, you might wish to reconsider. Flutter's full strength on the web comes from the ability to render a fully interactive website, but it is not suitable for Google’s bot, which makes indexing searchable.

Apps built with Flutter

• Google Ads
• Credit Agricole
• Google Earth
• BMW
• Toyota
• New York Times
• eBay Motors

2. React Native

React Native is an open-source mobile framework developed by Meta (formerly Facebook) as the tech giant's answer to cross-platform development. This framework allows developers to build apps for both Android and iOS with JavaScript and React, ensuring versatility across devices. Using declarative components, React Native makes it easy to create rich, native-feeling user interfaces that adapt well to mobile environments.

React Native features

• Reusable components across platforms: With React Native, developers can reuse components across iOS and Android, making it easier to maintain and scale applications. This feature significantly reduces development time by eliminating redundant code and ensuring consistency across platforms.
• Integration with native code: React Native allows developers to leverage platform-specific APIs and native modules for added functionality. This means you can use native code for performance-critical components and rely on the customer code per platform when React Native fails to deliver a high-performance user experience.

Advantages of React Native

• Development based on JavaScript: React Native is built on JavaScript, one of the world’s most popular programming languages. Web developers can easily adapt to mobile app development, reducing the need for additional training and allowing teams to work more flexibly. However, this very same advantage is also considered a disadvantage by Swift and Kotlin developers, who are not familiar with the JS approach.
• Speed and efficiency: With live reloading and reusable components, React Native enables teams to develop and iterate quickly, making it ideal for agile workflows and rapid prototyping.
• Large community and resources: Although this community is smaller in comparison to Flutter, it is a very mature framework, and React Native enjoys extensive support from a global developer community. This community contributes libraries, documentation, and plugins, making it easier for developers to find solutions and streamline their workflows.

Disadvantages of React Native

• JavaScript is not perceived as ideal for high-performance, experience-rich mobile applications. 
• Meta/Facebook could kill React Native: While Meta continues to support React Native, it did not build its newest application, Threads, using this framework. Meta is also ambiguous about the extent to which it uses React Native. While Flutter apps fully leverage Flutter and Dart, React Native apps are often used only for smaller parts of applications, raising questions about its significance in major projects. All of this suggests that there is a risk that Meta may eventually abandon React Native in the long run.
• Performance limitations: React Native relies on a JavaScript bridge to communicate with native elements, which can lead to performance issues for complex applications. Unlike Flutter, React Native is less suitable for resource-intensive apps that require smooth animations and visuals in general.
• Need for native code integration: Certain app features may require additional code written in native languages like Swift or Kotlin. This can increase complexity and limit some of the cross-platform advantages.
• Dependency on third-party libraries: React Native often relies on external libraries for native functionality, which may lead to compatibility challenges or limited support for new device features.

Apps (partially) built with React Native

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Airbnb
• Bloomberg 
• Walmart

3. Progressive Web Apps (PWAs)

Introduction to PWAs
Progressive Web Apps leverage standard web technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to deliver app-like experiences directly from a web browser. They are actually web pages which have an additional manifest and service workers. You can turn basically any page into a PWA, and in certain cases, it makes sense to do so. They run on any device with a modern browser, making them highly accessible and often cheaper to develop than native apps.

Advantages of PWAs

• Cost-effective development: If you already have a website that is created using modern JS frameworks, such as React, getting a PWA eliminates the need to create separate apps for iOS, Android, and the web. This reduces development costs and time while still reaching a broad audience.
• App store independence: PWAs can be installed as a shortcut directly from a browser, bypassing app store restrictions and approval processes, and allowing for faster deployment and easier updates.
• Lightweight and fast: PWAs typically require minimal storage space and can load faster than native apps, particularly in low-bandwidth environments.

Disadvantages of PWAs

• Limited access to native features: PWAs may not have access to all native device features, such as Bluetooth or advanced sensors, limiting their functionality for some applications. Push notifications are still not available for iOS either. 
• Browser compatibility concerns: Not all browsers support PWAs equally, which can lead to inconsistent user experiences across platforms.
• Engagement challenges: While PWAs can support push notifications, they may lack the deep device integration that enhances user retention and engagement compared to native apps.
• Unavailable on the App Store/Google Play: PWA apps are meant to run in a browser; they are not downloadable from the App Store/Google Play, therefore, they don’t have similar credibility in the eyes of users.
• Bluetooth (Web Bluetooth is available but less capable than native).
• NFC (Near Field Communication): unavailable on iOS.
• Background execution: PWAs can’t run intensive tasks in the background efficiently.
• Push notifications: limited on iOS (e.g., no background sync).
• Advanced gestures & haptics: less control over complex touch gestures compared to native apps.
• Camera & microphone access: available but not as deeply integrated as in native apps.

Companies that have used PWAs to some extent in their history 

• Twitter Lite (in 2017)
• Starbucks (for their mobile website)
• Pinterest (in 2017 for their mobile website)
• Uber (for m.uber.com)

4. Kotlin Multiplatform

Kotlin Multiplatform, developed by JetBrains, is a versatile framework that allows developers to share code across iOS, Android, web, and desktop apps. Kotlin Multiplatform isn’t limited to mobile alone; it lets you write shared code in Kotlin, with platform-specific code as needed. This unique flexibility makes it a strong choice for projects that require consistent functionality across multiple platforms.

Kotlin Multiplatform features

• Shared business logic: Kotlin Multiplatform lets developers share business logic while writing UI code separately for each platform. This way, you achieve consistency across platforms without compromising native UI performance.
• Interoperability with native code: Kotlin Multiplatform integrates seamlessly with existing native code. Developers can write shared code in Kotlin and use native code where necessary, giving flexibility for complex functionalities that are specific to a given platform.
• Beyond mobile: In addition to mobile, Kotlin Multiplatform supports JVM-based, web, and desktop applications. This versatility makes it suitable for projects that need code sharing across a broad array of platforms.

Advantages of Kotlin Multiplatform

• Reduced development time and costs: By allowing code sharing across multiple platforms, Kotlin Multiplatform significantly reduces both development time and costs. Developers can focus on building the core functionality once, saving time when expanding to additional platforms.
• Native performance and flexibility: Kotlin Multiplatform doesn't aim to replace native app development entirely, but instead complements it by allowing developers to use platform-specific capabilities while sharing code for core app functionality, optimizing both performance and development efficiency across different platforms.
• Strong Google and JetBrains backing: With Google and JetBrains invested in Kotlin, the framework is constantly improving, and the community of Kotlin developers continues to grow, offering resources, tools, and support.

Disadvantages of Kotlin Multiplatform

• Lack of shared UI between iOS and Android: Whereas the logic can be shared, you still cannot share the UI between the platforms. Therefore, developers must build separate UIs for both iOS and Android. This means that platform-specific code is always needed, and Kotlin Multiplatform is not yet a fully cross-platform framework. 
• Far smaller ecosystem and community support in comparison to React Native and Flutter.
• Complex setup: Implementing Kotlin Multiplatform can be challenging and often requires familiarity with both Android and iOS ecosystems.
• Young technology: Without official Swift UI support, Kotlin Multiplatform is a relatively new framework, and its implementation is still behind other, more mature cross-platform solutions.
• Limited community and libraries: Although growing, Kotlin Multiplatform’s community and library ecosystem are still developing compared to more established frameworks like Flutter or React Native.
• Tooling & Build Performance Issues: Although JetBrains are building the tools around KMP, Kotlin Multiplatform builds can be slow, and IDE support is not as mature as Flutter or React Native.

Apps built with Kotlin Multiplatform

• CashApp
• Quizlet
• 9GAG
• Philips (HealthSuite Digital Platform)

5. Apache Cordova

Apache Cordova is a long-standing open-source framework that enables mobile app development using web technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Cordova is known for its ability to package web apps as native mobile apps, making it a cost-effective solution for simpler applications.

Apache Cordova features

• Rendering based on WebView: Cordova uses WebView, allowing developers to create apps that look and feel like native apps using web technologies. This approach is efficient for building cross-platform apps with simple UIs and low native interaction.
• Access to native device APIs: Cordova plugins provide access to native features (like the GPS and file system, for example), enabling more functionality than typical web-based apps.
• Large plugin ecosystem: Cordova has a wide range of plugins for adding features, from camera access to push notifications, making it versatile and easy to customize for simple app needs.

Advantages of Apache Cordova

• Quick and cost-effective development: Cordova’s reliance on standard web technologies makes it accessible to web developers and allows for rapid prototyping, making it ideal for MVPs and budget-conscious projects.
• Wide range of plugins: The extensive plugin library offers access to most native device features, allowing developers to add specific functionality without extensive coding.
• Simple development workflow: No need to learn a specific new language or environment: Cordova allows developers to use familiar HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, reducing learning time and increasing productivity.

Disadvantages of Apache Cordova

• Limited performance and UI Customization: Cordova apps may not match the performance of fully native or high-performance cross-platform frameworks. Additionally, customizing the UI to look native across platforms can be challenging.
• Dependency on WebView: Cordova apps rely on WebView, which can lead to inconsistent performance across devices, particularly if the app has heavy interactions or animations.
• Plugin compatibility: Third-party native plugins may not always be up-to-date or compatible with all platforms, leading to potential issues in functionality and performance.

Apps built with Apache Cordova

• JustWatch
• Pacifica
• Untappd

6. MAUI (Multi-platform App UI)

.NET MAUI, introduced by Microsoft in 2022, is an open-source framework that builds on Xamarin. It utilizes C# and XAML for development and focuses on building apps for iOS, Android, Windows, and macOS. This makes it a strong option for developers in the Microsoft ecosystem, although it may have more limited reach compared to other cross-platform mobile app development frameworks.

MAUI Features

• Single-project structure: MAUI’s single-project structure unifies resources, assets, and configuration settings for all platforms, streamlining development and reducing redundant configurations.
• Integrated with Microsoft Ecosystem: MAUI is fully integrated with Microsoft’s development tools and services, including Visual Studio, Azure, and .NET, creating a seamless workflow for .NET developers.
• Cross-platform device access: The framework allows access to device-specific features like sensors, camera, and GPS to ensure apps work seamlessly across all platforms.

Advantages of MAUI

• Unified development for Microsoft environments: MAUI is highly beneficial for companies that already work within Microsoft’s ecosystem, providing a solution with familiar tooling.
• Hot Reload for faster development: MAUI supports Hot Reload, allowing developers to see code changes instantly, which speeds up the development and testing process.
• Customizable UI with XAML: MAUI’s UI layer allows for extensive customization while providing a native-like experience across platforms.

Disadvantages of MAUI

• Currently limited to .NET developers: MAUI’s reliance on C# and .NET makes it most accessible to developers with experience in Microsoft’s ecosystem, limiting its appeal to other programming communities.
• Relatively new in the market: Although it originated from Xamarin, MAUI is still a newer framework, and its ecosystem is not as mature as other options like Flutter or React Native, meaning fewer third-party libraries and resources.
• Performance inconsistencies: While MAUI aims to deliver smooth performance across platforms, results can vary depending on app complexity and targeted platforms.

Apps Built with MAUI

• NBC Sports Next (engine app)
• Azure App
• Seeing AI

How to choose the right cross-platform framework for your mobile project

Selecting the proper framework depends on your specific project needs, and multiple factors come into play when making your decision. 

Here are four key things to consider:

1. Project complexity and performance requirements

For projects demanding high-performance and intricate UI, Flutter stands out due to its direct-to-native rendering, which enables smooth animations and fast load times. While React Native is also capable of delivering native-like performance, Flutter’s engine provides a more consistent experience across platforms. 

If your app relies heavily on visual elements and interactions, Flutter’s customizable widgets are an excellent match. Simpler applications, however, might benefit from lightweight solutions like PWA or Cordova, especially when high FPS isn’t a priority.

2. Long-term goals

For apps that need extensive native capabilities or integrations, frameworks like Kotlin Multiplatform and .NET MAUI are often suitable because they allow more granular control over platform-specific features. 

As well as offering extensive support for standard mobile features, Flutter excels at delivering a consistent experience across multiple platforms from a single codebase. This makes it a versatile choice for long-term projects where adaptability across iOS, Android, web, and desktop is valuable.

3. Developer skill set

If your team has web development experience, React Native or Cordova may be more accessible due to their reliance on JavaScript. Teams experienced in .NET may find MAUI ideal, while those familiar with Kotlin will appreciate the flexibility of Kotlin Multiplatform. Flutter’s popularity has also made it increasingly accessible, with plenty of resources and a supportive community to aid developers in learning Dart quickly.

4. Budget and time constraints

PWA and Cordova offer highly cost-effective solutions for simpler projects. When working with a limited budget, frameworks that simplify cross-platform codebases can reduce both development and maintenance costs. By writing a single codebase that performs well on iOS and Android, Flutter often offers a faster time-to-market than native or more fragmented cross-platform approaches.

Summary

Choosing the right cross-platform technology is crucial for your mobile project; the right tech stack can save you time, money, and headaches down the road.

Whether you’re aiming for high performance with Flutter, JavaScript familiarity with React Native, or cost-effectiveness with PWAs, there’s a solution tailored to your project’s needs. If you're looking to create a powerful app efficiently, Flutter might just be the solution you need. 

By assessing your project's needs, budget, team, and long-term objectives, you can select the ideal tech stack to build cross-platform mobile applications that drive immediate success and lasting growth.