React Native has become a technology that opens up new opportunities in app development. Nowadays, it allows engineers not only to build for mobile, but also web, desktop, and VR apps.
Why is it valuable for entrepreneurs? By building your MVP with it, you lay the ground for the future product upscale. If you choose React Native, you won’t encounter the business growth issue when it becomes hard to handle many platforms with different codebases, say, one for Android, the second for iOS, and the third for the web or desktop. You’ll simply stay with React Native for all.
And there are even more reasons why many choose the framework to build their digital products. Let’s explore them before we proceed to learn more about the best React Native app examples.
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Reasons to choose React Native for app development
You may question why you should prefer React Native over Swift, Kotlin, or Flutter technologies. These are the reasons to choose it over other frameworks:
- It saves time. A single JavaScript codebase shares code across platforms. There’s no need to develop separate versions for iOS (with Swift or Objective-C) and Android (with Kotlin or Java).
- It saves money. Maintenance costs are reduced due to writing new features and fixing bugs only once. Compare it to doing the same for each platform.
- It gives flexibility. You can evolve your app faster with many ready-to-use solutions: OTA updates, push notifications, analytic tools, dynamic links, etc.
- It has a reusable code. The code and logic are the same as in React.js, so you can use the same code for the frontend side of the product web version and vice versa.
- It can be distributed in official stores. React Native is wrapped in a native bundle, so you can easily make your app available on App Store and Google Play.
- It has big community support. A Flutter framework by Google could be an alternative to React Native app development, as it allows you to build cross-platform native apps, too. However, Flutter is quite new and hasn’t grown a big community of developers yet.
Have a look at the market leaders who’ve chosen the framework for developing their applications or the whole ecosystem. Some of them have been loyal to the framework since its launch in 2015, while others transferred to it later when at some point were unable to control all platforms simultaneously. Maybe you’ll identify your goals with some of theirs and gain more insights on React Native app development.
The best examples of React Native apps
Why are the following apps called the best? First, if you look at the launch date of most of them, you’ll understand how stable they are. Another characteristic that reinforces the reputation of the product is the number of people using the app for their daily or professional needs, and these companies certainly don’t struggle with the lack of downloads. So, here are the React Native sample apps to pay attention to.
It would be fair to begin with the Meta ecosystem, as they created the framework itself, understanding there was a need for effective cross-platform development. Ads Manager was the first application ever built with the new technology. Check how retro it looks in the 2016 article by Meta today. Of course, they used React Native for their legendary social app development as well.
In 2021, Meta introduced their many platform vision of React Native, saying they will move towards adapting it to all possible platforms. Soon after extending React Native to desktop development, the Meta proved their vision by moving on to VR experiences and launched a framework’s adaptation to engineering Oculus. As they say, learn once, write anywhere.
Coinbase is a crypto portfolio for managing cryptocurrency transactions. The company is one of the best React Native app examples that changed the whole initial code. It took Coinbase around eleven months to rebuild their iOS (Objective-C) and Android (Java) apps with React Native.
They shared the challenges they were overcoming transiting from one code to another in their tech blog. The reason for the shift was the desire to boost the effectiveness of a team and apply a familiar programming language to cross-platform development — Coinbase already had their web engineering platform built with React. The change resulted in an increase across all business metrics.
Discord is an app originally designed for gamers to communicate online. Nowadays, it covers different communities that use the application as a convenient tool for chatting, studying, and collaborating.
Discord was one of the first to implement React Native technology. Like Coinbase, they say that their big achievement was a small but efficient team able to use one code for cross-platform engineering. And what they appreciate the most about the framework is that it connects web and mobile versions of their product.
Bloomberg L. P. is one of the leading companies functioning as media, research, data, and software centers concentrated on the financial field.
Bloomberg can undoubtedly be called one of the best samples of the React Native apps because, unlike many, it was made with it right from the start and shortly after the launch of the technology itself. The first app they made with React Native was a consumer mobile application informing users about business and financial news.
Walmart is a retail company that runs a chain of shops across the USA, Mexico, China, and Japan.
Walmart uses React Native for their shopping and grocery app. Their motivation for writing code with this framework was to improve a customer’s experience by adding an opportunity to download an app in addition to the existing web version. At that time, their codebase utilized React and Redux, so they were ready to dive deep into implementing another JavaScript-based tool.
Pinterest is a social media platform designed for sharing pictures and ideas, creating mood boards, and getting inspiration from visual content of any type.
Pinterest was familiar with React.js and used its components for their web app. So, integrating React Native into mobile development wouldn’t be a challenging task. However, they kept their natively built platforms that had reached the velocity of weekly updates by the time the new framework gained popularity. Instead of rewriting the platforms, Pinterest used it as an additional tool for their app. They implemented the Topic Picker feature, which helps users in the onboarding process. After testing it in real life, Pinterest decided that the framework might be the best for adding new to the existing code; it speeded up the team that was already using Gestalt with React UI components.
Microsoft closely partners with Meta; they use React Native for well-known apps (both mobile and desktop): Microsoft Office, Microsoft Outlook, Microsoft Teams, Xbox Game Pass, Skype, and more.
The company keeps working on improving the user experience by adding small features to mobile versions of the Office. To improve the performance of the framework, Microsoft makes changes in the core codebase and invests in developed features, just so as not to wait for the upgrade of the technology but rather take a proactive approach. This case illustrates the flexibility of an open-source framework when anyone can contribute to it and make the experience better for everyone.
Foreca is a weather forecasting app from Finland. It is one of the best React Native apps of its kind.
They transferred two of their native apps to a single framework back in 2018. One reason was to unify the customer journey for iOS and Android users. But their main motivation was an opportunity to implement updates into both platforms as soon as they emerge. The cross-platform development that React Native provides is essential for such a field as weather forecast due to features and multiple predicting resources that renew all the time.
Flipkart is the largest Indian e-commerce platform and company. They were among those who chose React Native right from the start.
Flipkart’s features were supposed to be the same across platforms. Hence, React Native was the best opportunity to build an app with a single codebase. And, like Foreca, they wanted a framework that would allow them to fix issues and implement updates across platforms without any complexity.
Bolt is an Estonian company offering mobility services: rides, delivery, scooters, and car-sharing. They cover over 500 cities in Europe, Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
Bolt chose the technology to build an app for scooter collection and deployment in the concrete city of Paris. What they needed was to implement a map view and QR-scanning camera. It’s another good example of how the framework can be used as a complementary convenient tool in an existing ecosystem.
Mercari is a marketplace where users can buy and sell items that are not necessarily new. Their mission is to give new life to old things. The service operates in Japan and the US.
Just like the Foreca service, Mercari fully switched to React Native with their iOS and Android apps. The reason to give a platform a new start was actually a success. Once the service reached the rate of 4.2+ million monthly active users, Mercari realized it was going to be harder to grow further with two different programming languages: Kotlin and Swift. They entirely rewrote their apps by June 2022 and shared their success measurements. For example, one of the improvements was the start time on Android which increased by 52%.
React Native apps by Ronas IT
At Ronas IT, we also use the framework for cross-platform development. Among our best React Native apps are OddsCrowd and Lainappi apps. There are also some we cannot tell about as they’re under the NDA, and we respect our clients’ privacy.
OddsCrowd
OddsCrowd was designed for the community of bettors. It provides users with the tools for making the best picks and updates them with the latest news about sports events. Users can participate in free games on the service and compete with each other.
OddsCrowd is represented on the web, iOS, and Android. The app addresses many info resources, including stats, numbers, news, and Legal US Sportsbook offers. For sure, some updates on bets, competitions, and picks require integration with third-party APIs. And React Native is the most convenient tool for handling updates and is certainly the best option for maintaining several platforms with the same functionality.
Outcomes
As React Native allowed us to use the same code for both mobile platforms, our team managed to finish the first app release right before the significant event. We managed to complete the project in just 10 weeks just before the Super Bowl.
Shortly after the release of the application, the monthly number of users increased by 10 times and got positive feedback on the online platforms.
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Lainappi
Lainappi is a Finnish service for the eco-friendly reuse of items. What they offer is an opportunity to take and give things for rent via special boxes with cells of different sizes. Lainappi needed an app with a convenient user interface where people could offer rent, choose items, book them, and pay for their use.
Together with the Lainappi team, we went on a three-month journey on which we redesigned their prototype, recomposed the user journey, and developed the first version of the application. To bring the app to the market as soon as possible, we rejected the idea of building two native platforms one after another and chose React Native for app development. Another reason for choosing this framework was its elaborate tooling, e.g. expo-location and react-native-maps, that allowed us to implement the map search feature in the best possible way and provided users with a smooth experience.
Outcomes
The service rapidly grew from just a chat between renters to over 80 boxes for leaving and picking items. We are still partnering with Lainappi in maintaining the app and implementing new features into it, and they’re planning to extend the service to other countries.
The app has been downloaded by more than 5600 users by now.
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If you have an idea for an application, Ronas IT team is always ready to work through it. To discuss your plans with us, fill in a short form on the website.
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