What is a cross platform application development and who is the King?

In today’s world where there are probably more mobile apps than the humans using those apps, building a mobile app that is appealing to multiple platforms is a great way to ensure user satisfaction across varying devices. You do not want to start coding an app for one platform only to realize midway that you need it for another platform.
This not only increases overheads of much larger effort to develop, test and maintain mobile apps for different platforms, this also could lead to a non-coherent user experience of users across various devices due to lack of consistency of app development across various platforms.
Xamarin is an open-source platform that promises flawless performance and layout across the three dominant mobile platforms, namely, iOS, Android and Windows Phone, as well as Mac and Windows apps.
Xamarin stands out as King of cross platform mobile app development technology for many many reasons. Some of the reason for our love for Xamarin are:
1.It Consists of Xamarin Android, iOS, Test Cloud, and HockeyApp

Xamarin has different compilation strategies.Xamarin.iOS, Xamarin.Android offer developers to create apps for android & iOS with the same UI controls that are offered for other platform apps.
Xamarin frameworks are another important feature of mobile app development. It is separate from Xamarin.Android and Xamarin.iOS. It offers different ways to design the UI of mobile applications. Initially, you code the Native UI for each platform with a single codebase. Secondly, you code UI for different platforms with 100% sharing. Developers could create a prototype or a mobile app with a design that has a similar code for Android and iOS.

While Xamarin.Forms create apps for Android and iOS, Xamarin.Mac is a product of a framework that allows you to design apps for macOS.

Xamarin Test Cloud is used for testing Xamarin code on several platforms. It is a cloud-based application and provides tools that support automated UI acceptance. HockeyApp is used to collect feedback for the app. You could choose the combination of .NET library functionally and Mac OS X APIs for mobile applications.

What’s amazing is with Xamarin, 0-80% of code could be reused and constructed in C#. The amount of code that could be reused depends on the model of Xamarin development chosen between forms, iOS, and android.

2. It Works on Smart Devices Including Wearable Tech

It not only supports the development of mobile applications but also works on smart devices like wearable tech. Developers could use Visual Studio to create applications for Windows, Mac, and smartwatches.

3. Native Applications

Everyone prefers using native applications for their business. The Xamarin frameworks have access to the native APIs that are currently used for platforms like android, iOS while the nativeness is the result of some platform-specific elements that can be found in C# and Visual Studio. In addition to this, Xamarin. Forms further ensure the creation of convenient UIs for platforms like iOS, Windows as well as Android.

4. Shared Application Code

Another feature why Xamarin is the preferred choice of developers is that they could share the codes across several platforms, making it easier for them to build an application. The important UI logistics like back-end API interactions and web service calls are coded with C#.

5. Less Worry About Hardware Compatibility Issues

With Xamarin, you don’t have to worry about hardware compatibility issues. It offers a range of APIs and plug-ins and supports cross-platform app development, which allows the developers to enjoy native-level interaction with device hardware. It minimizes compatibility issues.

Overall, Xamarin is the new king of cross-platform development. The rich features and the resulting benefits of Xamarin all point towards flawless cross-platform native applications. In addition to the above-mentioned five reasons, Xamarin boasts an ever-growing community of 2 million plus developers who are continuously collaborating and enhancing the software.