There are currently 7.1 billion users of mobile phones in the world and the number is constantly increasing. With the ever-increasing number of mobile users, the use of mobile applications has also experienced an impressive hike. Currently, mobile applications are serving as the need of the hour. With its lucrative features, mobile applications are helping businesses of all kinds create a stellar online presence for themselves meanwhile building their credibility and improving their sales.
When it comes to mobile application development, a number of approaches can be used, however, the process still remains the same. Below we have curated an article that will take you through each step of mobile app building.
- Idea and Discovery of Product
Ideation is the first step of mobile app development. You will need to come up with an idea and create a foundation on which you can base your entire project. Research plays a vital role in any development process and here it will help you identify the viability of your overall project. During this stage, you will need to brainstorm ideas and figure out how your idea will fulfill the end user’s needs.
In this phase you will need to:
- Determine the objective of app development
- Research your competitors
- Identify the needs of end-users
- Select an approach for mobile development
- Strategy and Planning
This is the stage where your idea will finally start taking shape and will transform into a live project. You need to create a solid strategy for your product development and list some detailed functional requirements for your app.
Product Team: Determining your skill requirements is also an important part of your project. Based on your app development approach and planning, you will have to decide on the number of developers and other team members for the development process. Also, if you want your application to be compatible with both Android and iOS platforms then you will want to have both developers in your team.
Product Roadmap: A product roadmap helps you visualize the strategy of your mobile app development. For timely execution of your idea, it helps you outline the key aspects of the project like vision, mission, strategy, technology, product features, and team.
Product Structure: Establishing Minimum-viable Product (MVP) is also an unskippable step that helps you dissolve any issues concerned with the budget and time frame of the project.
- Mobile App Designing- UI/UX
The UI/UX, that is the User Interface and User Experience Design respectively are one of the most important factors of mobile development that determines the success of your design process. During this stage, you will have to focus on the designing of the app and will also need to take some important aspects into consideration, such as function, usability, and branding of the application.
Apart from this, the design of the application needs to include some more features, such as:
Wireframes: The development process for the user interface design of mobile applications is called a wireframe. The wireframe can be considered as a pictorial depiction that represents the key elements of the user interface like icons, layout, fields, buttons, etc. It is quite helpful in giving you a visual idea of the application and the overall aesthetics.
User Journey Map: The User Journey Map is concerned with representing the user experience. A journey map should be developed by your development team that can represent the user flow of the application.
Style Guide: A style guide shows app function details such as UI frames, standardization of UI elements, end-to-end experience, uniformity of the app, consistency of the UI elements uses, and usability-driven process flow.
Prototype: A prototype allows you to have a glimpse of how your mobile app works. This proves to be really useful when the technology is new and the concepts are not tested before. It helps you understand the user experience of your application.
Mockups: Mockups are used for rendering the visual design of the application. By combining style guides with wireframes, you can get information about the interconnection between the different elements of the design and establish a flow of the app.
- Development of the Mobile Application
The actual realization and the coding of your application are covered by the app development agency in the step-by-step development of the app.
Application Programming Interface (API): API is useful in connecting the app with the back-end server or the database and also aligns the OS components along with the existing system.
Back-End Server: Your back-end platform should be efficient to support the functionalities of the application. While using an existing platform, you need to make sure it is assisting the configurations and modifications.
Programming Language and Database: This is where you need to decide whether you are having a native app or a hybrid one. For building android applications, you need languages like Java, C++, or Kotlin. For iOS app development, Objective-C and Swift languages are used.
Mobile Front-End: Your application must have a strong front end to have an impressive user engagement.
Frameworks, Libraries, and SDKs
Integrated Development Environment and Code Editor
- Mobile App Testing and Quality Analysis
After completing the above-mentioned process, developers must thoroughly test the app for quality and fix the bugs. It is an important step in app development that gives another perspective to the planning and execution of the app.
Mobile app testing is comprised of the following:
- Functionality Testing
- Performance Testing
- Security Testing
- Manual Testing
- Automated Testing
After testing your application thoroughly, and fixing the bugs, your application can be submitted for approval to your client or project manager.
- Mobile App Development and Launch
Now that everything is done, all you need to do is launch your application. You can publish it on Google Play or Apple Store and it can also be launched on an enterprise app store if it’s concerned with the entrepreneurial world.
