Do you need the app store?

ReadyToBinge, a side project of mine, has both. You can use it in the browser and put it on your phone as a web app, and a separate native app is in the App Store and on Google Play. That app is there because people expect an app in the store, and because I still think a real app is the better choice when people mainly use something on their phones. I explain why in App, web app or website: which one do you need? The app store and the browser each give you something different, and which weighs more for you depends on how people reach your product and how they use it.

What an installable web app is

The technical name is progressive web app, or PWA for short. It is a website with a few extra building blocks that make a phone treat it more like an app. It gets an icon on the home screen, opens without an address bar and can store part of its content on the device.

You install it through the browser. On Android the browser usually offers this by itself. On an iPhone you tap the share button and then “Add to Home Screen”. Nobody has to approve that step, and people don’t have to open a store for anything.

With ReadyToBinge you open the site, scroll through trailers and rate what you see. Each title shows where it is available in your region, and you can talk it over with friends in its own thread. If you want it on your phone, you install it from the browser or get the app from the store.

What you gain without an app store

A link is enough. You forward it, print it on a flyer or put it in a QR code, and someone can try what you made straight away. Installing can come later, if they like it.

There is also no review. When a new version goes live, people usually get it the next time they open it, so a mistake is quicker to put right. You don’t have to keep developer accounts with Apple and Google, and no store commission comes off what you sell. If you take payments online, a payment service does charge something.

One product runs on iPhone, Android and laptop. That is less to build and less to maintain, and that feeds through to the price.

What the app store gives you

People search in the app store, and an app can be found there by those who don’t know you yet. Installing there takes one press of a button everybody knows. With a web app on the iPhone you have to explain to people that they need to go through the share button, and not everyone will make that effort.

A store also gives people confidence. People see reviews and a familiar place, and they can pay with what is already on their phone. For subscriptions the store handles much of the admin, in exchange for that commission.

A real app also has the widest access to the camera, location and notifications, including while it runs in the background. A web app can do part of that, with more limits on an iPhone than on Android: notifications only work there once someone has added the web app to their home screen. That is how it stands at the time of writing. Apple and Google change these rules regularly. Swiping, scrolling and opening are also smoothest in a real app, and you notice that in something you use every day.

How to choose for your own product

The first question is how people reach you. If you bring them yourself, with a link or a QR code at the counter, you don’t need the store to be found. If strangers have to find you by searching, the app store does help. A sports club that wants a calendar for its members can simply send the link to its members. Someone making a fitness app for everyone wants to be in the store.

Then look at how it will be used. Will people mainly use it on their phones, ideally every day? Do you need camera, location or notifications in a way a browser can’t manage, or only with difficulty? Then everything points to a real app. If people also keep working in it on a laptop, or open it now and then, a web app is often enough.

If your customers keep asking where they can download your app, that alone is a good reason to have one.

You can also do both

That is what ReadyToBinge does: the web app stayed, and a separate native app was added. You can also start with a web app and go to the store later. You can then reuse most of the part on the server.

You can also wrap a web app in a thin app, so it can still sit in the store. Google has an official way to do this, Trusted Web Activity. At Apple it is harder, because the rules ask an app to go beyond a repackaged website. A wrapper like that doesn’t get through review there as a matter of course.