Flutter Pros and Cons 2025 – Summary and Recommendations

Edit: Article fully updated in December 2024

Our clients often come to us curious about Flutter and eager to understand how it can create business value and whether it's the right choice for them. Flutter has gained popularity among product teams for its ability to deliver high-quality cross-platform apps quickly. But choosing the right technology for your project goes beyond development speed—it’s a strategic decision with long-term impacts on your business. To make the best choice, you need to understand what the advantages and disadvantages of Flutter are for your business before you give it a go. 

In this article, you will learn:

• Is Flutter popular in 2025?
• Is Flutter good for app development?
• Is Flutter open source?
• What are the advantages and disadvantages of Flutter?
• Does Flutter have good performance?
• Can you make web apps with Flutter?
• Can Flutter be used for desktop apps?
• What apps are built with Flutter?
• What large companies use Flutter?
• What is Flutter Add-to-App and when to use it?

If you don’t know what Flutter is, start by reading our page dedicated to Flutter technology.

Why do CTOs and Tech Leads choose Flutter?

The whole magic of Flutter lies in its ability to deliver beautiful, high-performance native apps across mobile, web, and desktop—all from a single codebase. With Flutter, a developer writes one set of code that then compiles (i.e., transforms) directly into the native applications for each operating system, saving time and resources. This means you don’t need separate iOS and Android teams; one Flutter developer can handle it all! But that’s just the beginning. Let's examine why companies increasingly choose Flutter regardless of their size.

Flutter is a mature cross-platform solution used by enterprise teams worldwide.

Flutter was released in 2017 and has constantly gained popularity and support from developers and companies in all regions. It isn’t a niche technology anymore but a mature cross-platform framework used by enterprise teams worldwide. Flutter has shown incredible growth—not just within the framework itself but across the ecosystem of packages supporting it. We asked CTOs, Tech Leads, and Engineering Managers about their views on Flutter's suitability for large-scale projects from different time perspectives. A total of 71.2% of respondents agree that Flutter has been ready for enterprise apps over the past 3 years, while 85% believe Flutter will be even more suitable for large-scale projects in the next 2 years.

What’s more, from the Flutter CTO Report, we can see that size doesn’t matter. While Flutter remains powerful for PoC and MVPs, it is also widely adopted by larger teams, as almost 40% of Flutter teams have 6 or more Flutter Devs. According to the Flutter CTO Report, 13% of Flutter apps have an audience of 1M users and above. Besides that, the increased trust in Flutter is shown in inspiring case studies that emerged from seasoned teams building large-scale apps.

Success stories from teams at Credit Agricole Bank, BMW, Tide, Philips, Tencent, Betterment, Toyota, Wolt, and iRobot have shown that Flutter can deliver not only large-scale apps but also high-performing, secure solutions that pass rigorous security and penetration tests. This convinced other brands, such as Whirlpool, Virgin Money, Universal Studios, Geico, SoFi, Headspace, Ebay Motors, Caribou Coffee and more to try Flutter's strengths.

Google places its full trust in the technology it created.

Some of Google’s flagship products are built using Flutter. They use this technology in both their internal projects and public-facing applications. Products like Google Ads, Google Pay, Google Classroom, YouTube Create, and more of their apps rely on Flutter's powerful cross-platform capabilities to deliver fast, beautiful, consistent user experiences worldwide. Google has proven that Flutter is enterprise-ready by using Flutter for many of its enormous apps. Google has also invested in building internal Flutter teams that ship new products. Their commitment to using Flutter for their purposes is a powerful endorsement of the technology and its long-term potential. If Google trusts Flutter to serve millions of users daily, imagine what Flutter could do for your next project! 

You can watch our interview with Craig Labenz, Developer Relations Engineer at Google, to expand your knowledge about the future of Flutter and how Google uses it.

The vast majority of CTOs and Tech Leads would choose Flutter again.

A remarkable 95.7% of CTOs, Tech Leads, and Engineering Managers say they’d choose Flutter again based on their experiences, and 52% are extremely likely (10/10) to recommend it; such a result clearly shows that it is the best alternative for them. While no technology is without its challenges, Flutter’s impressive NPS/CRI score of 73 shows that most users are more than happy with it. As Craig Labenz highlights, this high level of satisfaction reflects a strong vote of confidence. This aligns with broader data showing that professional experience with Flutter significantly boosts the likelihood of recommending it.

Flutter is fast becoming the go-to solution for mobile teams looking to streamline their mobile development and enhance performance across platforms. According to our Flutter CTO Report, 73.6% of respondents said their entire mobile development team is building Flutter-first mobile apps, while 16.8% mentioned that some of their teams use Flutter alongside other solutions. These results come from nearly 300 decision-makers in terms of choosing technology for their companies who took part in our research. 

No wonder, because Flutter’s advantages regarding development speed are undeniable, and speed is everything in the fast-paced world of app development. Flutter development is seen to be faster than native development. A total of 56.4% say Flutter development is more than 50% faster than native technologies, while 24.8% claim Flutter development is at least 20% quicker. Flutter's ability to build apps for multiple platforms from a single codebase boosts development speed and efficiency. 

Although Flutter has been built as a go-to technology for mobile app development, only 30% of companies use it only for iOS and Android. Over 95% of respondents choose Flutter for each mobile OS (iOS & Android), 64.4% use Flutter for web applications, and many leverage Flutter for desktop apps (macOS 24.1%, Windows 20.1%, and Linux 11.2%). Flutter is not just a trend but a strategic advantage for companies looking to innovate and lead in the digital space.

The Flutter community is growing, which has a positive impact on technology.

In 2025, Flutter stands out for its vibrant community and the many contributors actively supporting it. The entire ecosystem—from the Dart programming language to the framework itself—is fully open-source, allowing anyone to contribute to its development. This openness enables developers to build and enhance tools for various needs, driving Flutter’s rapid growth and innovation.

Flutter's popularity among developers has steadily increased, surpassing its closest competitor, React Native, in 2021—a lead it maintains. Flutter’s edge lies in its seamless integration of native features when required (e.g., through native SDKs) and its exceptional developer experience, characterized by stateful hot reload, robust tooling, and a stable package ecosystem. This popularity is further demonstrated by Flutter’s strong presence on GitHub, which is consistently garnering attention from experts across the industry and seeing increased adoption.

Is Flutter suitable for scaleups?

Flutter as a technology is very flexible, allowing you to create various apps—small for startups and large for enterprises. It’s great for small applications since it allows for fast application development with the low-cost delivery of the final product. But let’s dive deeper into framework usability based on the smaller apps we delivered with Flutter.

Mindy is the mindfulness app. For this project, we have chosen the Flutter framework for mobile app development and .NET Core for the server side. Flutter allowed us to provide a unique ease of experience similar to popular apps like Calm and Headspace (which, by the way, is also moving to Flutter) and set up a subscription-based business model. The latter was possible due to the ease of integration with the native SKDs for in-app payments for both Apple Pay and Google Pay solutions. What is more, the initial part of this project was delivered during the summer internship program, which proves it's an efficient solution.

Another example of ease of development is Welliba, an application that measures employees' mental health. This German scaleup based in Hamburg delivers a complex HR system, which allows for self-tests and personal monitoring of its users. Flutter proved very efficient in building a Design System based on a complex set of reusable forms and inputs to conduct various tests and questionnaires. This project is also an example of junior in-house developers on the client’s side gaining experience in Flutter while delivering new features with the assistance of LeanCode’s team. 

Existing applications can also benefit from using Flutter. The perfect case is the Activy app, a Polish well-being application that enables HR departments to engage their employees with custom sports challenges. The Activy app, in its previous versions, was implemented in React Native and featured some native elements, most notably activity tracking. The app also employed a state management solution typical of React and React Native at that time—Redux. The entire Activy app was successfully migrated from React Native to Flutter. Flutter's architecture allowed for high performance and smooth animations, leading to better app responsiveness. This improvement resulted in a more satisfying user experience.

Is Flutter good for enterprise application development?

The number of excellent case studies from experienced teams working on large-scale apps and using Flutter is increasing. The abundant evidence that Flutter is good for enterprise application development comes from teams like BMW, LG, Universal Studios, Headspace, Viessmann, Bayer, Sonova, Whirlpool, Xiaomi, eBay Motors, Geico and more, proving that large-scale apps are achievable with Flutter and are performant and bulletproof when it comes to security and penetration tests.

One of our examples of an enterprise Flutter project is the case of MASPEX POSme. POSme is a product tailored to manage marketing-related processes among the company’s salesforce. MASPEX, one of the leaders in the FMCG industry in Poland, manages hundreds of POS materials daily, reaching retail outlets nationwide. Planning, production, and distribution are a huge logistical challenge, and success depends on the work of many teams. Implementing the POSme automation system with Flutter has improved the management of POS materials and introduced several benefits for the business: time savings, improved user experience, and reduced errors in the distribution of materials to the sales structure. Flutter proved very efficient for building a rapid MVP and enabling a quick time-to-market for further extensions.

If you want to learn more about Flutter for enterprise apps, read our guide from a technical perspective, where our expert dives deep into best practices, challenges, and strategies for building large-scale applications using this technology.

Is Flutter good for banks and fintech?

Regarding enterprise projects, Flutter is also a great technology since it’s a scalable solution proven in production by many, even in the banking industry, which often has higher standards in terms of the software used and more complex needs. It’s trusted by banking companies. 

Banks that have developed mobile banking apps with Flutter for specific markets are: Credit Agricole Bank Polska (market: Poland), ING Bank (market: Poland), Nubank (market: Brazil).

We interviewed senior executives from the three banks mentioned above and asked them how willing they were to recommend this technology for banking apps. Their response was very positive, with the same score from all three banks of 9/10. As mentioned earlier, in our Flutter CTO Report report, 85% of the respondents consider Flutter suitable for large-scale projects compared to 71.2% for the past 3 years.

At LeanCode (the software development company), we had the opportunity to create the mobile app “CA24 Mobile” with Flutter for Credit Agricole Bank Polska, along with other business partners. This bank wanted to bet on more innovative and modern technology that would accelerate their product and strategy development. In one year, they have developed and made available to their customers a completely new application with many features that were missing in their previous app. This was made possible by Flutter technology. Flutter also enabled the implementation of a complex design system and animations. In 2024, Credit Agricole hit a major milestone: over 1 million customers use their digital channels, CA24 Mobile and CA24 eBank. They’ve also rocketed up the rankings in the category of traditional banking—from 10th place in 2022 to 7th in 2023 and 3rd in 2024. Plus, they achieved scores of 80%+ across every audited service aspect, including mobile banking.

Advantages of Flutter for mobile app development

Flutter brings a range of powerful advantages to mobile app development, making it a standout choice for businesses and developers alike. From rapid development cycles to a highly customizable UI, Flutter delivers tools that save time, enhance user experience, and make app maintenance easier.

Here’s a closer look at some of the top benefits that make Flutter an exceptional choice for building high-quality apps:

1. Cross-Platform Development: Flutter allows developers to build apps for multiple platforms, including iOS, Android, Web, PC, Mac, and Linux, all from a single codebase. This significantly reduces development time and costs over the life of a project.
2. Outstanding Performance: Flutter delivers excellent performance, and when optimization issues arise, the "performance overlay" feature helps identify resource-heavy actions, making it easy to optimize app performance.
3. Smooth Animations: Flutter supports animations seamlessly, maintaining a stable refresh rate of 60 or 120 frames per second (depending on the device) and ensuring smooth and responsive user interfaces.
4. Consistent User Interface: Flutter's architecture allows for a uniform look and feel across all platforms while enabling platform-specific customization, providing flexibility without compromising consistency.
5. Rich Libraries and Widgets: Flutter’s vast collection of packages, well-designed APIs, and pre-built Flutter widgets enable faster development, making it quicker and more cost-effective to add new features with minimal code.
6. Native Features Access: Flutter supports platform channels that make it easy to access and use native features, ensuring you’re not restricted from achieving a native-like experience on different platforms.
7. Strong Community and Google Support: With its large and growing community and strong support from Google, Flutter is a reliable choice for mobile app development. It has become Google's second most popular open-source project, with over 166,000 stars on GitHub at the beginning of 2025.
8. Growing Talent Pool: As Flutter’s popularity continues to rise, finding experienced developers and building in-house teams is becoming easier. More native developers are willing to migrate to Flutter than over the last 3 years: the number of native iOS Devs willing to transfer to Flutter has risen from 24.2% to 35.5%, and the number of native Android Devs willing to transfer to Flutter has increased from 42.3% to 51.9%.
9. Proven Stability: Applications of various sizes have been built with Flutter. Moreover, Google is investing heavily in Flutter, even rewriting some of its flagship applications using the framework, which speaks to Flutter’s stability and maturity as a technology.
10. Quicker time-to-market: By reducing development time, optimizing cross-platform workflows, and offering tools to streamline app creation, Flutter helps bring apps to market more quickly.

There are other specific advantages related to building your application architecture or enterprise applications using Flutter, and we cover them in other blog posts. Sign up for our newsletter to make sure you’re up to date.

Disadvantages of Flutter for mobile app development

Still, despite all the positive implications of choosing Flutter, you need to be aware of some drawbacks. Most of them are related to creating a web app from Flutter code, so they don’t belong in this section. However, we have observed that many of our clients who have chosen Flutter for mobile development also wanted to use it for the web since this is essentially free, provided the mobile apps were already built using Flutter. We go into more detail about Flutter for Web in another part of this article. 

Here are the top arguments often raised against Flutter, as highlighted in our Flutter CTO Report. We’ll dive into each one, address the concerns, and show why they’re not as big of a deal as they might seem!

Fear of Google discontinuing product support

“Will Google kill Flutter?” is an eternal political question. Since its creation in 2017, Flutter has grown to be extremely powerful and competitive. Any problems related to its previous editions have been resolved, and Flutter is becoming the default choice for building new mobile applications worldwide. However, one of the arguments against Flutter is currently related to the fear that Google may stop supporting it for internal reasons. Those are purely political arguments. This argument was mentioned by 56.1% of respondents in the Flutter CTO Report. 

We strongly believe that this is not going to happen, and here is the proof:

1. Google continues to migrate some of its products to Flutter (Google Earth, Google Pay, Google Analytics, Google Ads, Family Link, YouTube Creators, and many others). If they ever abandon Flutter, they will need to rewrite those apps using new technology.
2. Flutter is giving Google a negative headcount effect. The apps mentioned before are much cheaper to maintain than if they were written using native technologies with separate teams for iOS, Android, and Web apps. 
3. Google is gaining traction in revenue from smaller projects in Flutter that use Firebase and Firestore, as they are part of the default, recommended setup. 

Still, in this worst-case scenario, you need to remember that with the scale Flutter has already achieved, community members will surely fill this gap.

Difficulties with hiring senior Flutter developers

Approximately 29% of respondents mentioned having difficulties hiring experienced Flutter developers. The challenge of hiring senior developers appears valid regardless of the technology discussed. As Flutter's popularity grows, so does the demand for skilled developers. With more companies adopting Flutter for their mobile and cross-platform apps, there’s a competitive market for qualified professionals, making it harder to find available talent. At LeanCode, we lead a 30+ Flutter mobile team, which is still growing, and we have never had a problem finding the best out there. You can contact us to engage senior Flutter developers to develop your mobile Flutter app or to reskill and train your current developers.

Delayed support for the newest platform-specific native features.

Regarding mobile development, you need to be aware that in rare cases of new OS releases accompanied by some new platform-specific features, they may not be instantly available on Flutter. As many as 26.4% of Flutter CTO Report respondents listed this as an argument against Flutter. Theoretically, there may be a delay between adding something to the operating system and making it available on Flutter. It may require native implementation on your own before the Flutter team does it. Yet, out of all cross-platform frameworks, native implementation on Flutter is the easiest, and the fact that Flutter offers this alternative solution as a default for integrating all external libraries makes it very competitive.

At LeanCode, we have already built 60+ Flutter projects, and only once did it turn out that we were not able to implement a specific feature using Flutter, namely with Apple AppClips. This feature is intended to demonstrate the app's features without downloading it; however, we think that this is Apple’s workaround to help developers avoid building the web versions of their apps, and as explained before, Flutter does that more or less for free. So, from the business perspective, this goal can be achieved in an even more user-friendly way.

The evolution of cross-platform technologies

Flutter is one of many of its kind. The mobile app market has been growing rapidly for many years, so it’s no surprise that companies are creating new technologies to help release new projects faster and cheaper. Creating two separate mobile apps for Android and iOS is a time-consuming and expensive process. To simplify that, many frameworks were built to help create one app that runs on multiple platforms. 

One of the first attempts was Apache Cordova, released in 2009, which allowed for the creation of hybrid web applications using web technologies. After that, other options, such as Xamarin and React Native, started to pop up. In 2017, Google released its open-source framework for creating multi-platform applications called Flutter.

Let’s compare sentiments towards Flutter with other technologies.

Flutter vs. React Native

Flutter shines in projects where customization is key. With its single codebase and extensive widget library, Flutter enables rapid development while ensuring a consistent, polished look across platforms. It’s an ideal choice for apps with complex animations and high visual fidelity, delivering impressive performance for demanding applications. Flutter also offers superior performance with its native compilation and custom rendering engine, providing smoother animations and faster app startup times than React Native, which relies on JavaScript and native bridges.

React Native, on the other hand, is a good choice for projects focused on speed and leveraging existing JavaScript expertise. Its well-established ecosystem makes it easy to build solid applications quickly, using extensive libraries and third-party packages. This framework is perfect for apps requiring frequent updates and dynamic web content like news platforms, thanks to the code push feature. However, more complex UIs may need additional libraries to achieve the desired results.

To find out more, read our Flutter vs. React Native comparison, where we break down each platform in detail and help you choose the best fit for your project!

Flutter vs. .NET MAUI

Flutter offers a unified UI with customizable widgets for Android, iOS, web, and desktop, ensuring consistent design and performance. It provides faster development with features like hot reload and a rich plugin ecosystem. Compared to .NET MAUI, which uses native controls and focuses on mobile and desktop, Flutter delivers broader cross-platform support, better community adoption, and stronger performance with its Dart engine.

.NET MAUI can be a solid choice if you're already working with C# and .NET, as code between C# projects can be copy-pasted and tools are familiar and integrated with .NET. In that case, choosing MAUI for building a prototype or a small application can be a better choice. .NET MAUI also offers deep integration with the Microsoft ecosystem and supports seamless integration with Azure cloud services.

To learn more, read our Flutter vs. .NET MAUI comparison, where we focus more on detailing each platform so you can understand the differences between these two technologies better!

Flutter vs. Kotlin Multiplatform

Flutter offers a faster development cycle with a single codebase for both Android and iOS, ensuring that logic, UI, and performance remain consistent across platforms. Its rich widget library and reactive framework enable highly customizable UIs. Unlike Kotlin Multiplatform, Flutter includes a comprehensive solution for both frontend and backend logic, streamlining development, reducing complexity, and accelerating time-to-market for mobile apps. It’s possible because it provides an integrated framework that covers the entire app development stack, from UI to business logic.

Kotlin Multiplatform, on the other hand, is a strong choice if you’re already working in Kotlin or need shared business logic in multiple environments. It is designed primarily for code sharing across platforms but doesn't provide a complete, unified solution for building apps. It allows you to share business logic, such as data models or network calls, but relies on native frameworks. However, it boosts productivity by reducing duplicated code and simplifies maintenance while preserving native performance and UI. Kotlin Multiplatform integrates seamlessly with existing projects, allowing gradual adoption and leveraging existing libraries.

Is it possible to add Flutter to the existing app?

But what if you already have a native mobile application? Once you know all the arguments in favor of Flutter, you may have some second thoughts after choosing the native approach. You need to understand that your choice was right, and only recently did Flutter gain enough maturity to convince established players to move their apps to Flutter. 

How do you migrate your native application to Flutter? The most comfortable scenario from the technical perspective is a green field project where you can start everything from scratch. Yet, this would mean that the development of the current app would most likely be withheld, which is unacceptable for the business. 

The good news is that even if you have a natively built mobile app, you can still use Flutter to add new features. This Flutter feature is called Add-to-App and may be an advantage when you want to start your migration. The Add-to-App feature allows you to create new app features and rewrite other parts of the app in Flutter while still keeping your existing project.

Of course, you can also rewrite your entire app at once to base it entirely on Flutter. It may be a good idea if your app isn’t that complex, but at the same time, it is outdated and needs an update. With such migration, you can easily improve the UI and fix issues in the app. If you have a project and you want to verify whether Add-to-App can be used in your case, you can use our audit service, and we will check that for you.

You can also review our guidelines for using the Flutter Add-to-App feature in our article, based on a case of migrating a native banking app to Flutter.

Flutter for Web

The current state of Flutter for Web isn’t ambiguous anymore—it feels like a full-fledged product (even more so with the new support for WebAssembly). Flutter for Web has come a long way. It is increasingly production-ready, as evidenced by high-profile applications like Google Earth and Google Classroom utilizing it for parts of their web interfaces. In Google Earth, for example, all shared UI across the web, iOS, and Android platforms is now built with Flutter, though its complex 3D map rendering remains outside Flutter’s scope. Other apps like Superlist have also adopted Flutter for Web, showcasing its capabilities for multi-platform, complex UI needs.

In our Flutter CTO Report, the percentage of CTOs convinced that Flutter in 2025 is becoming a serious alternative to web development frameworks increased from 15% to 33.8%.

However, Flutter for Web is not for everyone. It’s not a one-to-one replacement for technologies such as React, Angular, Vue, or Svelte. So, as it often is in tech, it depends on your particular requirements. One aspect to pay attention to is searchability and SEO indexing. In other words, Flutter is good for web apps but not for landing pages that need to be indexed, which is important when your business and the content you create depend on being found by users in a browser.

The Flutter development team has ensured it’s stable and production-ready since version 2.0 in early 2021. In reality, even though it’s becoming more and more stable with each update, some problems still prove it’s not always a viable solution.

You can watch our interview with Kevin Moore, Product Manager at Google, to discover the strategic vision behind Flutter for Web.

What are the best use cases for Flutter for Web? 

Flutter for Web is best suited for use cases that require rich interactivity, dynamic content, and complex UI elements rather than traditional, text-heavy websites like landing or marketing pages. While HTML is better for linear, text-focused pages that rely on easy navigation and fast loading times, Flutter Web shines in scenarios where users interact with complex, non-linear data and need a more app-like experience.

For instance, highly interactive web applications, dashboards, tools for data visualization, and productivity apps benefit from Flutter’s robust rendering engine, which supports advanced animations and graphics. This makes it ideal for apps where users spend extended periods, as they won’t be impacted by slightly longer load times. However, since Flutter Web doesn’t use the traditional DOM, it lacks strong support for content indexing, so it’s less suited for pages that rely on SEO.

In summary, Flutter Web is ideal for rich, interactive web applications and internal tools. Still, it is less appropriate for content-heavy, indexable web pages where fast loading and SEO are key.

Also, you should ask yourself if your product is mobile-first or if you want to focus on building just a website for a start.

“Yes, I want a web app as an add-on to my mobile app.”

If the former is true and the webpage is just an add-on to your mobile application helping you to handle some edge cases, then go for it. For example, we can tell you the story of a fintech app for our French client, a company developing a car leasing platform. In their onboarding KYC process, they needed to upload certain financial information (i.e., the P&L and balance sheet). From the UX perspective, this is more challenging when operating on mobile. Therefore, the idea was to build the web version of an app in parallel to redirect users to the web for those who failed to upload their documents when onboarding in the mobile app. 

Another example is a project we developed for a cryptocurrency exchange company. Using Flutter for Web solutions helped this client build a mobile app alternative way faster than if they had started from scratch. We could reuse the mobile design and animations such as variable charts. Also, deploying this web app has been easier—you only need to host it once, and it's available on all platforms. So, overall, you can achieve good results with Flutter for Web, which shortens the development time.

Yet, if your primary focus is the web, and you don’t plan to build mobile apps in the foreseeable future, or the case for your mobile apps is weak, i.e., there will be no reason for the users to use your app regularly, then you might want to use the traditional web technologies. 

What are the disadvantages of Flutter for Web? 

If, based on the arguments above, there is a business justification for using Flutter for Web, then you need to consider the main obstacles from the technology perspective.

1. First of all, Flutter Web does not support the SEO and discoverability of your website. Flutter aims to provide “dynamic application experiences,” even on the web. As such, Flutter is not equipped with tooling for search engine optimization. Web crawlers simply cannot see the final rendered app. The initial page source contains no elements of the widget structure—it gets created after all the resources are loaded and the JavaScript initialization code is executed. If your business relies on people searching for your website, the Flutter team recommends using plain HTML instead of Flutter. However, this may not be a big problem for the cases where the website requires login, so the Google bots will not be able to penetrate it no matter what technology is used.

2. The other problem is with the application size. For rendering (i.e., generating), the website requires the Flutter engine. With WebAssembly and the Skwasm renderer, it's about 1.1 MB—still quite a lot, but it's going in the right direction. Before, there was a CanvasKit renderer, which was about 1.5 MB. In some rare cases, when you need to secure the highest website loading speed or your website will be loaded in regions with a poor network, this can become an issue.

3. The hot reload feature doesn’t work with a web app. This issue refers more to developer experience, but it’s worth mentioning. One of the most valued features of Flutter is hot reload—the ability to dynamically update code without rebuilding the app. This functionality relies on the underlying native Dart runtime. Since code is compiled to JavaScript on the web, this feature doesn’t seem viable. The available alternative is hot restart—the only difference is that hot reload remembers your state, and hot restart doesn’t.

As Flutter states: “Not every web page makes sense in Flutter, but we think Flutter is particularly suited for app-centric experiences: progressive web apps, single page apps, or existing Flutter mobile apps.”

All in all, recent additions to the framework make working on web apps significantly easier and allow for more use cases. Flutter web app development can be a good choice for your overall strategy, especially if your main cases are handled through mobile applications—then Flutter for Web is a great solution. Flutter for Web has officially been a stable product, and the team behind it brings exciting updates in each release. Don’t rush this decision, and make sure you are familiar with the disadvantages of Flutter for Web, which are listed above.

Flutter for Desktop

Flutter can suit more than just a mobile app case since it effectively incorporates the "write once, run anywhere" philosophy into its way of working. However, from the perspective of the Flutter roadmap, Flutter desktop app development is still a young solution and less advanced than Flutter for Web. In 2022, Flutter's 3.0 version came with support for native desktop platforms such as Windows, macOS, and Linux so that everyone could use apps written in Flutter on their computers.

Flutter for Desktop shares some infancy problems with Flutter for Web, such as a lack of packages, libraries, etc. However, it has a very promising perspective because there are only a few technologies for building desktop apps and no major blockers for this one. According to our Flutter CTO Report, 29% of respondents see the possibility of deploying to the desktop as one of Flutter’s advantages. 

As of Flutter 3.19, the impeller runtime is available for macOS (besides mobile platforms such as iOS and Android) along with video_player_plugin. The main advantages of supporting Impeller on macOS are that it improves the animations' performance and eliminates the troublesome shader compilation issues.

It’s worth mentioning that the Flutter team is not currently prioritizing further development of Flutter for Desktop, which was emphasized in the Flutter roadmap for 2024. Still, effort is constantly being put into Flutter for Desktop development, which is focused on introducing platform views that allow the embedding of native views in Flutter apps. The lack of this feature can pose a challenge to desktop apps that embed websites or Google Maps. The feature is already available for macOS but is not stable yet.

However, a practical example of the Flutter Desktop application is our case study with Lotte Wedel, a well-known confectionery brand in Poland. They needed a desktop application available via multimedia kiosks to create a unique, interactive experience for visitors at Wedel’s Chocolate Factory in Warsaw. For this project, we used Flutter for Desktop, which enables such ventures and is a great way to improve customer service in physical branches.

To sum up, while accessing native functionalities might not always be easy when using Flutter for developing desktop applications, Flutter for Desktop still has much to offer, especially for non-complex cases. Flutter, among other available cross-platform solutions, is worth recommending.

Benefits of Flutter: Conclusions

Flutter is taking the market by storm, especially for mobile application development. Flutter app development has numerous advantages, including cost efficiency, faster app development, short time-to-market, and ease of team organization. Flutter in 2025 has become a default choice for new, green-field projects, but it can also be used as an Add-to-App with existing applications written in native languages. 

Not sure if Flutter is the right fit for your upcoming app? We're here to help! Schedule a call with us to discuss Flutter app development services, and together we’ll explore whether this cross-platform technology aligns with your development goals.

If you have a mobile team and want to add expertise and Flutter experience, read more about our IT Staff Augmentation services.