The demand for mobile app development is significantly increasing, the industry is evolving in leaps and bounds. Just look at the numbers: the market revenue is predicted to reach $808.7 billion in 2022. To survive in this fast-changing digital world, companies have to stay in the loop and implement the latest mobile app technologies.
I had a chance to sit down and talk about prevailing mobile app development trends in 2022 with Roman Chekashov, a leading industry expert in Android Software Development with more than 8 years of experience.
Super Apps
Supper App is a new type of mobile app that aggregates the functionality of multiple different apps in one package, thus making the lives of users easier. The reason for super apps' extreme popularity among users is that they don’t need to download a multitude of applications, but still get the functionality of all of them in just one app.
Super apps change the business rule that previously seemed to be permanent: the target audience for a product shouldn’t be “everyone”. Nevertheless, supper apps do just that: provide numerous services covering most needs of every consumer.
Super apps like WeChat have a huge market share in the world. Having more than 1 billion active users, WeChat accounts for around 10-15% of the social media market. It started off as a messaging app, but now consumers can pay for restaurants, book train and plane travel, buy movie tickets, pay bills and taxes via WeChat.
Western companies are already going towards this trend as well, says Roman. Take an example of Uber: it slowly and steadily adds new services to the platform.
AI & ML
AI, ML and related technologies dramatically changed the lives of business owners during the pandemic. They helped to turn traditional models into cost-effective and streamlined business processes. 2022 also promises an increased number of implemented AI and ML projects. Here are a few possible reasons:
- Due to the pandemic, businesses digitization accelerated remarkably, thus increasing IT budgets.
- AI greatly impacted and reduced risks of environmental issues including climate change.
- Cybercrime rate is increasing at a fast pace. AI-powered cyber-security solutions were able to efficiently tackle the issues.
Among multiple AI and ML trends Roman highlighted the following:
- Use of AI in cybersecurity. AI has already proved itself to be useful for preventing cyber attacks. There are, however, smart hackers who can manipulate data used in model training and access sensitive data. To fend off these cyber threats, businesses now need AI solutions to thoroughly screen all data used for model training and to embed security elements in the AI models.
- Use of AI for environmental issues. Business and governments in 2022 are predicted to implement AI solutions to cope with carbon emissions, global warming, deforestation and others. For instance, Google applied deep learning to their data-center cooling technology and got a 40% reduction in energy consumption.
- Healthcare Advancements. Just look at an amazing example related to treating brain tumors. AI and ML can help to differentiate tumor heterogeneity specific to every patient and then can be used to make personalized treatment decisions instead of a one-size-fit-all treatment approach. The solution is great as the technologies can use information just from clinical MRI scans, eliminating the need for additional expensive examinations.
- No-Code ML: Codeless ML gets rid of time-consuming processes, including modeling, algorithm development, data collection, debugging and others. That’s why it’s cost-friendly and easy to implement as there is no need for hiring Data Science experts.
- TinyML: TinyML includes models developers can run on small, low-powered devices (e.g. microcontrollers). Thus the power consumption reduces by up to a thousand times. Consequently, low power consumption enables the TinyML devices to run unplugged on batteries for weeks or months, while running ML applications on edge.
Video Conferencing
Apart from virtual backgrounds for team video conferences created with the help of Augmented Reality (AR), video conferencing had progressed in many ways during a crisis. For example, field service providers can exploit the technology to guide remote users and help resolve issues. A user just needs to point a smartphone camera at a home appliance. The technician then can use AR to demonstrate actions to fix it.
The pandemic has made shopping hardly available. Consumers like to get a sense of items they’re browsing. This is where virtual assistants come into play. Shopify, for instance, collaborated with a virtual shopping technology provider Hero to help customers get a more real-life experience. Now merchants can show a product online, answer questions about it, provide advice and check inventories. This trend is likely to continue to expand in multiple industries.
Video conferencing in telemedicine is already in use. Before the pandemic virtual care was used for urgent issues or minor illnesses like cough or cold. In 2022 the goal is to add value and integrate the solution for chronic-disease cases or ongoing behavioral-health therapy, where patients will be able to eliminate regular travel in and out of doctors' offices.
AR & VR
Besides AR embedded into video conferencing apps, there are a lot more features in 2022 to watch out for. Most of us are familiar with an amazing AR app developed by IKEA, where users can measure home furniture and see exactly how it would look when in their rooms. There is even more.
AR apps will help customers to tour around huge shopping malls and products easier. The app can suggest an optimized shopping route, display the location of the desired item and even show a path to discount offers. For example, Lowe’s, a leading home improvement brand in the US, already introduced an in-store navigation app to help customers shop conveniently.
A virtual showroom is one of the growing trends in 2022 as well. It's a digital scene, where customers can explore a variety of goods with VR glasses. Clients can view products, their characteristics and costs just like in a brick-and-mortar store.
Security & Anonymity
As the rate of cyberattacks grows year by year, cybersecurity is now a matter of concern not only for individuals but for businesses as well. Therefore, the leading companies in the world will take cybersecurity to the next level in 2022.
For example, in WWDC21, Apple introduced a new feature called “Passkeys in iCloud Chain”. The feature will replace passwords with a more secure login process.
The newest Android version will also provide higher security and anonymity levels: apps will ask users’ permission for access to most of their personal information.
5G
5G is an additional point that will bring all the mentioned trends to a new level. As 5G is 100 times faster than 4G, the following improvements will take place in 2022:
- AR & VR integration will be much easier;
- Video streaming apps will be significantly improved;
- Transferring data between devices will be faster;
- New features will come into play without losing the quality of app performance;
- Biometric identification will be faster, meaning that associated services like mobile payments will be processed quicker and in a more secure way.
Overall, 5G gives companies more space for innovation.
In Conclusion
Roman emphasized that more and more businesses in 2022 will deploy these technologies for survival. To thrive businesses and developers have to think out of the box as customer expectations are growing as fast as technology trends change.