Flutter has been used for over one million iOS and Android apps (data from May 2023). Flutter is also an open-source mobile UI framework written using C, C++, a programming language called Dart, and Skia Graphics Engine, developed by Google and released in beta in May 2017 (the first stable version was released in December 2018).
Flutter is used to build cross-platform apps, which means iOS and Android applications built with Flutter use a single codebase, compile directly to the ARM native code, and access the platform APIs and services without any communication bridge. With Flutter, you can create well-performing, user-friendly, and beautiful apps in no time. We believe Flutter offers even better solutions than React Native (which also can be used for mobile app development).
The Flutter framework has its core components being developed by the Google team, which is a plus for its further development and stability. Even tho Flutter is still a new technology; it's a fully stable solution. Google team takes care of its stable support and is transparent about the development roadmap, planning at least one year ahead and considering developers' opinions while making fixes and improvements.
Moreover, Flutter supports building apps on a wide variety of devices and form factors, including web, and mobile platforms (iOS and Android), and desktop (Windows, macOS, Linux); living rooms (TV, Stadia); smart displays (Assistant); and beyond (cars, embedded devices, and appliances).
Flutter helps its users create the best experiences for their applications with its fast, productive, open, and pervasive toolkit. It also allows for the implementation of solutions necessary for accessibility support. It is also constantly developing - the Google Flutter team announces changes regarding the development of Flutter on average 3-4 times a year.
The major change in the Flutter 2.0 version was to confirm the sound null safety, which is mathematical proof that no object references will have null or void values. Flutter 2.10 covered a wide range of improvements, including updates across Android and iOS and the web. Another significant change was allowing the production of Windows apps on the stable channel of Flutter by default.
Flutter 3.3 version came along with Dart 2.18.1 and brought some exciting widgets, features, DevTools, and useful VSCode extensions that can improve app development. Google is also working on increasing its supply chain security and bringing the infrastructure in line with the requirements described in SLSA documentation. They have achieved Supply Chain Levels for Software Artifacts (SLSA) Level 2 security.
Besides that, the broad developer community is an additional source of market credibility for the product. Since Flutter's early days, it has been attracting developers who emphasize the ease and speed of Flutter app development (as a result of Flutter's architecture), even with a demanding user interface (visual components) and complex animations. Plus, it's a multi-platform solution (for iOS and Android apps).
Flutter does its own UI drawing, which frees us from being dependent on the operating system version. Also, the declarative style of Flutter’s UI programming means you describe only once what the UI should look like for any given state.
Flutter uses Dart programming language. It is also a client-optimized language for developing fast apps on any platform, mainly because the same Dart scripts without modification work in iOS and Android native apps without modification.
Flutter is an open-source project with contributions from many companies and individuals worldwide and from Google. The availability of many open-source libraries shortens the time of Flutter app development.
Flutter has an engaged community that impacts the improvements and the ease of use. So when developers come across issues with code, they can look at Flutter's well-written documentation with many detailed and interactive examples of basic use cases.
Flutter is a set of software development tools and a cross-platform solution that allows it to build web, mobile, and desktop applications from a single codebase. It significantly increases the speed of application development.
Hot reload allows a developer to edit code and apply those changes immediately. Flutter has a hot reload feature, so when a change to the code appears, it can be seen instantly in the application, which positively impacts development.
The Flutter framework was created with the intention of primarily supporting the development of mobile applications. However, the development of web rendering technologies like HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and Flutter's capabilities (Flutter 3.0 release) has also become suitable for web app development. It is also still developing to support different platforms.
Using Flutter, the existing code can be easily compiled into a client experience, embedded into the browser, and then deployed to any web server. Flutter offers support for Desktop devices, meaning mobile applications can be scaled to Windows, Linux, and macOS without needing to rewrite code. You can create beautiful apps with less effort.
Although Flutter is in a unique position of being able to target web apps designed for this new web generation, and there are also great achievements in Flutter development for desktop applications, we need to admit it may not be as effective as technologies and frameworks dedicated strictly to them. So, each case of building web applications in Flutter needs to be considered separately.
You can also count on our experience and advice in Flutter for web and Flutter for desktop.