I think the advocate retort is that lack of support on iOS makes them a nonstarter for developers on all platforms. I think this argument is more of an excuse.
Right, Android has something like 70% global marketshare. PWAs aren’t popular because they don’t really benefit developers/businesses. They also don’t offer any advantages in user experience over a native app. Apart from the economics, there’s no developer friction advantage since you can use something like react native and deploy anywhere.
The kind of deep user information you can gather by installing a full blown app compared to a more sandboxed web app is worth way more than the 30% royalty cut.
What world are you living in? Web apps are literally 100+ times faster to start using, much easier to share, much easier to market, and you can offer much cheaper services as apple doesn't take a large cut of payments.
If what you say is true then you could find a platform bigger than something like TikTok or WhatsApp that is a PWA. The only one I can think of is Google.com, which technically is built in to your mobile OS anyway.
100+ times faster to start using: are they? I can type in the name of an app into my OS-wide search and tap “get” and that’s it. Swipe down, type “candy crush,” tap “get.”
Easier to market? What’s easier than saying “download the [name] app?” Arguably more complicated to say “go to example.com”
Much cheaper services? What is cheaper than TikTok or WhatsApp? Those companies make more money on the apps because they have more user data collection. Companies like Netflix go around the App Store cut entirely.
With installed apps the desires of the corporations and users pretty much align.
There is great value in building one product instead of three.
>The kind of deep user information you can gather by installing a full blown app compared to a more sandboxed web app is worth way more than the 30% royalty cut.
Great value to whom? The only value I've ever heard of that made any sense at all was "saves me money and lets me change things and publish them faster" and that (as other commenters have said) is a developer / manager value, not a user value.
It's tempting to think so, but IME users download apps to get things done more than they want to "ooh" and "aah" over an app's UI changes and I've been an app developer since 2009. It's all too easy to push out someone's pet feature (or something to buff up someone's resume for their next job) and if it's a speed-focused company it's a coin flip whether there is someone acting as the gatekeeper to keep that kind of nonsense out.
I can’t believe Apple is holding back my vision for a resurgence of COBOL apps. If only Apple would support native cobol apps, surely Android would follow and the world would see peace and prosperity forever. /s
