Directions of Mobile App Development Trends in 2016

Challenges for 2016

Previous years reveal the leading role of innovations and the most likely trends for the future of the mobile industry. Profound changes are driven by new gadgets, such as Google Glass, Apple Watch, fitness trackers, Android Wear and other wearables, along with the idea of the Internet of Things and cloud technologies. And, it is already possible to investigate some main challenges for developers in 2016.

“Write the code. Change the world.”

The motto supporting Apple’s new language Swift ambitiously announces its entrance in the digital order sustained in the past years. Swift combines features both as an application and a systems language. Being built on a progressive compiler infrastructure, it gives developers the tools to create a more qualified and reliable code from the very beginning. According to Tim Cook, as a part of Xcode tools during the first month after the release, Swift was downloaded 11 million times. The popularity will only continue to increase with the aim of going open source. Swift, the way it is today, was not designed to replace Objective C, but will be noticeably faster. Even at its nascent stage Swift is on the spot for developers in their intentions to implement it in iOS, OS X, watchOS, and tvOS in the nearest future.

Enterprise apps are more profitable for developers

The constant increase in the sales of mobile devices creates a demand on appropriate applications. Among the estimated amount of 1,5 million available apps in Google Play Store or Apple’s App Store, almost half is oriented on improving the performance of enterprises. The reason is very simple; business is able to pay more, especially for the tools that will bring dividends. The average income is about $10k per month will continue to attract more developers, than other sectors. Moreover, around 35% of leading companies are expected to develop their own mobile app development platforms by 2016 that will result in mobile app demand outrunning the IT companies’ capacity to satisfy it by five to one in the 2017.

Cross-platform tools will take the leading positions

No longer is it comfortable to be restricted to the usage of only a single platform. Significant amount of devices with advanced level functionality require the support of multiple platforms. The surge of cross-platforms will be intensified by the rise of cloud computing. Such cross-platform tools as Sencha, PhoneGap, Appcelerator Titanium, Unity3D, Cocos2d, Qt, Corona already exists nowadays. An ability to work on a common language and the easy maintenance of apps are the two main advantages of cross-platforms. The first benefit allows developers to design native apps with updated features and improved functionality, to create a better user-friendly interface and to translate to faster app development and iteration. The second benefit allows reducing maintenance costs due to the specifics of the working process that involves only one team of developers, who share common knowledge.

Internet of Things progresses to a new level

This system of systems speaks for itself. The size of the possibilities can be imagined only by understanding that by 2020 more than 5 billion people and 50 billion things will be connected to each other, and IoT product and service suppliers are expected to have total revenue over $300 billion. The global IoT market is estimated to have a growth at CAGR of 31,72%  by 2019. The vast opportunities for developers are rather clear in this context. From cars to household appliances, from mobile devices to wearables – everything will require operating control under appropriate applications. Today IoT is already adopted by various enterprises that establish the beginning of a new paradigm in digital technologies.

Security

Probably it is the most stable and actual trend through the history of the Internet. People will always pay additional attention to the safety of their data, especially when information on bank data and SNN, on private life and content can be accessed by hackers. As the Gartner report showed, 3 out of 4 every application will most probably fail basic security requirements in 2015 and the problem will remain in the next year. For instance Apple, the iOS 9 platform features high-end security protocols that developers should be able to fit without compromising the integrity of the platform. The same situation is with Android. Their security protocols for Android 6.0 Marshmallow are even harsher. So the challenge for the developers will be to avoid any security gaps and informational leaks in order place their products in App stores.

These are the main directions of mobile app development trends in 2016. Specialists from https://www.intellectsoft.net/mobile-development have shared with me this information and thereby helped me to write this article.

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My name is John Stuart. I’m a professional web and mobile developer with over 7 years experience in these fields. Started as a common coder I began to read and learn, read and learn. And now I can say that I’m a professional web developer.