Likelihood to Recommend Flutter is well known for native app development, if you have android studio installed on your system, you can quickly start using it. This might not be the best choice for you if you do not wish to learn a new language, i.e. Dart and you do not know it already.
Read full review - Inexpensively and rapidly creating multi-device (
Android , iPhone) native apps. - Quick ramp-up time allows for rapid development. - Open source tools can be used to develop. - Lightweight code-based can be easily shared and developed in a team environment. - Use of React, Vue, and angular leverages well-known coding and application design frameworks that are transportable.
Read full review Pros User interface design works great across all platforms, including native styling for iOS/macOS. Native compilation for mobile platforms and a decent rendering engine results in slick apps that can make the most of your device. Dart is a well thought out language and easy to pick up. Makes cross-platform development of good looking GUI apps a doddle. Read full review Nice command line interface for repetitive development and deployment tasks. Realtime preview (in web browser) during development. Easy to update and keep current (open source) via command line. Provides nice set of mobile widgets for consistency across devices. Read full review Cons Occasionally updates to the Flutter SDK result in wide-sweeping changes that seem to not be thoroughly tested and considered. Flutter sometimes evolves too fast for its own good. While the 3rd-party Flutter package ecosystem is vast and rich, 1st-party support for basic things (audio/video playback, battery information, Bluetooth services, etc.) are lacking. You are occasionally forced to rely on an open-source package for use-cases that other platforms have native support for. Documentation, particularly around testing, is lacking. While there are some great docs, like the Dart Style Guide, many Flutter-focused support documents are lacking in quality and real-world usability. Flutter allows you to architect an app however you want. While this is a great feature, it also adds complexity and leads to the current state of Flutter's state management, where there are 50+ options on how to organize your app, with very little official guidance or recommendations from the Flutter team. For a beginner, this can create decision paralysis. Read full review Slightly better documentation when it comes to command line build troubleshooting. Increased widget library (even though it's much improved today). Native chart/graphing widgets. Read full review Alternatives Considered I have experience with react and
React Native . I would say that the idea behind all those frameworks are quite similar. However, I found the javascript-based frameworks a bit more accessible as you could utilise your javascript knowledge. Here, Flutter works with its own language. This has advantages and disadvantages sometimes. I found the community around javascript frameworks bigger and therefore sometimes more helpful. However, Flutter does a good job here as well. I think the main argument for Flutter is its usability for less experienced developers. If you do not have knowledge in javascript or other programming languages then I think it is much easier to start with Flutter than with another framework like react. I think the package that you get form scratch is better than in the other frameworks were you have to set up and learn a lot more before you can start.
Read full review Android Studio Busy Confusing Marginal IDE Large footprint Single device development IonicFramework Lean, no IDE needed Web browser preview Multi-device development Scripting of build packages for deployment Read full review Return on Investment The rapid development capabilities of Flutter allow us to build apps we could not have previously considered commercially viable, opening new revenue streams. Free and open licensing made adoption very easy (ie. free/low cost!). In comparison to Qt, our time spent arguing with build tools and perfecting development environments has decreased substantially. Read full review The ability to create a mobile app quickly by a single developer (saving $20K). Increased customer satisfaction. Avoids outsourcing costs of $10k-$20k. Read full review ScreenShots