What does the future hold in store for the humble app?

It's 2009, the year Chesley Sullenberger miraculously landed US Airways Flight 1549 on the Hudson River, Barack Obama is sworn in as President of the USA and Apple runs an add with the famous tag line, "There's an app for that!", which would go on to become synonymous with it's App Store. Fast forward 10 and a bit years and a lot has changed. There's currently around 1.85m apps on the App Store, making it the second-largest behind the Google Play Store (source: Statista, 2020). It has generated over $155 billion in earnings for developers (source: Apple, 2020) and has led Apple on a path to expand into the services sector, following the introduction of technologies such as iCloud, Apple Music, Apple News and Apple TV+. It has undoubtedly been a successful period, but what do the next 10 years have in store for apps?

(Source: Cult of Mac, 2010)

How have web apps grown?

In recent years, there's been tremendous growth in the number and quality of web-based applications. For example, Google's G Suite offering is built from a foundation of web apps and both Apple and Microsoft have moved towards this, enabling access to suites of web versions of some of their core applications, through iCloud and Office 365 respectively. Many media streaming services can be accessed through a web browser, whilst also offering dedicated mobile applications. We have seen this in education too: notable apps such as Adobe Spark, Book Creator, Explain Everything, Kahoot!, Socrative and many, many more offer both web and dedicated apps.

Part of the reason that could account for the growth in this area, is the quality of the user experience. As technology has advanced, developers have been able to replicate most of the features available in traditional apps, within their web offerings. In fact, in some instances (G Suite, we're looking at you), the experience using a mobile app is actually inferior to the experience of using a web-based version. Does this represent a shift and hint at where apps are heading? Only time will tell...

How are devices adapting?

It's not just the apps that are changing, it's also the devices we're using. However, the Big 3 (Apple, Google and Microsoft) have all taken different approaches in this area. In 2011, Google launched its first Chromebook: a device running ChromeOS. This marked a significant shift from traditional operating systems, as it did away with the idea of installing traditional apps, instead of allowing users to access web applications through a browser. This has proved a major success, especially in the competitive education market, where demand for a low-cost, easy to use device is high.

Apple has adopted a different approach, offering laptop/desktop devices and mobile tablets, each with a dedicated operating system. It looks likely that they will continue to follow that model into the future with Apple repeatedly stating that they do not plan to merge macOS and iOS. However, it seems apparent that the gap between these is narrowing, especially with the announcement that developers would be able to adapt iOS apps for use within macOS. In addition to this, at the launch of iOS 13 at WWDC 2019, Apple announced it was bringing "desktop-class browsing to iPad" (source: Apple, 2019). This represents a significant shift regarding the use of web apps, as the mobile browser on an iPad had always stifled this. It made it possible to make use of most web apps, directly from the browser on your device. However this led to another issue: web apps were designed for use on a desktop/laptop device and didn't naturally allow users to interact through touchscreens. Apple has now taken further steps to address this. In iOS 13, they introduced support for mouse input and in March 2020, released a new iPad Pro along with a keyboard featuring a trackpad for the first time. This has seemingly moved the iPad Pro more towards a laptop replacement, than any device within the line up previously had.

Microsoft has traditionally featured a fully-fledged operating system. Whilst there had been efforts to develop a mobile version, these have since been discontinued. Windows seems to fit the best of both worlds: a uniform operating system across all devices, which allows users to install traditional applications and programmes, or make use of web apps. This has meant that Microsoft has had to make only subtle adaptations. For example, begun adapting Windows, at least to some extent, to make use of touch gestures reflecting the number of these devices now on the market, including their own Surface lineup. The interface may not be as simple to use as iOS yet, but Microsoft has traditionally dominated the marketplace and the look and feel of Windows remains familiar for many.

Why web apps make sense?

For users, developers and admins, web apps make a lot of sense. Firstly, they're accessible on any of your devices, without the need to download additional applications, which take up storage on your device. Furthermore, it means that users get the same experience everywhere. This consistency means users easily become familiar with a web app and do not have to drastically adapt their ways when using different devices, as they may have to do when using a combination of web and traditional applications. It's good news for developers too: rather than having to adapt and maintain applications for different platforms, they can instead develop a single web app, which works across a wide range of devices, increasing their potential market and saving them both time and money. Finally, for admins, the burden of having to package, maintain and update applications is removed, again representing a significant saving in terms of time and effort.

The issues...

It's worth noting though that web apps are not without their issues. Perhaps one of the most significant is privacy. Apps purchased through app stores, will possibly have had at least some degree of vetting. Apple's very stringent regulations may be a source of frustration for some developers, but ultimately protect consumers, whilst Google are a little more relaxed about what is allowed on their store. The same is not true of web apps: developers can publish these with little or no regulation. This is unlikely to be significant for major players, but users may be more hesitant to put their trust in a smaller startup. Furthermore, whilst the development of web apps has been tremendous, some still aren't quite able to match up in terms of features, when compared to traditional apps. For many users who just want to carry out relatively basic tasks, this shouldn't be much of an issue, but power users may shun them in favour of their more feature-packed desktop counterparts. Then there's the updates: whilst admins may rejoice, updates can be a scary prospect for many. Apps could drastically change overnight, due to updates with little warning and this is beyond a users or admins control. This can represent a major headache and will mean support teams will need to quickly be able to adapt to any changes, in order to assist users.

Conclusions

Web apps have experienced massive growth in terms of development and popularity. As time goes on and technology advances further, it's possible that many will replicate features that means they will be worth rivals of their desktop or mobile rivals. So does this mean we will shun traditional apps in favour of web apps in future? We guess time we'll have to wait and see...

We'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.