What is React Native Used For: A Short Guide

React Native what is? For those who do not know, React Native or RN is an open-source framework that allows you to build apps on multiple platforms like iOS or Android and web applications, using the very same code base. 

Here’s what you may find as a definition at the official RN resource:

‘React Native combines the best parts of native development with React, allows you to create truly native apps and doesn’t compromise your users’ experiences. Besides, offering you the best-in-class JavaScript library for building user interfaces.’

You may create genuinely native mobile apps that don’t compromise your users’ experiences. With react native, also known as RN, you can develop mobile applications using JavaScript.

Advantages of React Native

Here, too, everything is straightforward. React Native is needed for multi-platform development for iOS and Android simultaneously. This, in turn, saves the business money, as they may hire one developer on React Native instead of two for iOS and Android developers separately.

Disadvantages of React Native

There is only one drawback of RN, and this is performance. Unfortunately, the speed of work on React Native is not so great, so this technology is not very suitable for high-performance applications. It is better to use Flatter for this.

Flatter also allows you to create a multiplatform application, and does it much faster than React Native, using a different programming language as a basis, and this is Google’s Dart, mostly.

How does React Native work?

The basic principle is simple: React Native uses a React element or JavaScript code. It recodes it into the code necessary for the chosen operating system during the project development. For example, for Android, it is Java, and for iOS, it is Swift.

What is react native app? It is mostly not very fast, since such code cannot always be much optimized, and it all very much depends on how you set up the project.

React vs React Native

React is a declarative, efficient, and flexible JavaScript library with great support for building user interfaces. But what is react native? React Native is a platform for developing mobile applications on Android and iOS platforms. It is based on React knowledge.

React Native allows you to build mobile apps utilizing only JavaScript. It exposes the same design as React, enabling you to create a rich mobile experience from declarative components.

With React Native, you are not building a “mobile web app”, “HTML5 app”, or “hybrid app”. You are creating a real mobile app indistinguishable from an app built using Objective-C or Java. And here are the key differences you may discover:

Source: Educba

When coding with React was too long and complicated, using React Native made the code simpler and easier. So, if previously, developers had to write different codes for iOS and Android, now in React Native, you just need to go to Native Code and optimize the code according to your requirements. So, developers don’t have to develop different codes for iOS and Android, which saves much time and other project resources and makes React Native a really flexible tool. React should rather be used for web applications.

Why you need to use React Native?

React Native allows you to create applications using only JavaScript. When developing with this platform, you didn’t make an HTML5 or mobile web app, but a mobile app that is hard to distinguish from apps built using Java/Kotlin or Objective-C/Swift.

So, the same language – JavaScript, the same rules for building a UI and a component system, but React Native is great until you start doing something heavy, multiple-screen, and used incremental logic. Another way, the app will begin to work harder and harder.

But you need to use React Native if you need a fast, flexible & seamless solution for cross-platform development.

Examples of React Native mobile app development are Skype, Tesla, Walmart, Airbnb, etc.

Conclusion

What is react native used for? React Native makes it easy to write mobile apps for Android and iOS, and even most of the code you may produce can be easily applied across platforms. While React Native is best for both iOS and Android mobile app development React is best for web app development.

Organizations have switched to React Native for their mobile app development because React Native provides an entirely different development style where you can get high-speed feedback as a compilation. The time in React Native is short and very powerful. Therefore, for mobile application development, React Native will be an ideal solution that saves time and money, as well as speeds up the launch to the market.