What are PWA apps?

Progressive Web Application (PWA) is an innovative technology that allows you to download a website that works as an application to your smartphone. It is enough to launch a company website and create a PWA application to reach a wide audience of customers. Let’s figure out what are the main advantages and disadvantages of progressive applications, and also solve the main question – whether commercial organizations should develop PWA applications.

What are PWA applications?

Progressive Web Application (PWA) provides the site with the functionality of a native application. If you are using a desktop browser, the PWA application will function like a standard website. But if you open a PWA on an Android or iOS device, you get a functional hybrid of a website and an app.

In practice, PWA applications work very simply and conveniently. When the customer visits the company’s website, the system offers to add it to the main screen. It is enough to accept the offer, so that the site icon instantly appears on the main screen. It only takes two clicks to install the application. At the same time, you do not need to go to Play Market or AppStore. PWA applications are installed to bypass antivirus programs that prevent files from unknown sources from being run.

Once installed on a device, a PWA creates a site cache by performing two important tasks:

• the website becomes available to the user in offline mode;
• the download speed increases, allowing the client to access the resource within seconds.

Let’s list the main principles of PWA applications, thanks to which the technology is in high demand:

• The Web application interface adapts to the screen of any device, so you can use the application on almost any gadget.
• PWA is similar to a native application, supports all the functionality needed by the user, but at the same time does not require a constant connection to the Internet and takes up a minimum of device memory.
• Install the application in one click is offered by the browser when visiting the company’s website.
• Sending push notifications helps maintain contact with the audience and re-engage customers.
• PWAs are available for indexing by search engines with proper SEO optimization.
• The application always offers fresh data, which is updated when the Internet connection is restored.
• The system uses standard urls, which makes it possible to share links.

Today, 80% of modern browsers, including Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, and Edge, are compatible with PWA application technology. In other browsers, the functionality of the application remains unavailable or partially available.

What are PWA applications for?

PWA applications are the best choice for companies whose services are regularly used by customers: online stores, restaurants, online schools, beauty salons, network organizations, auto repair shops, etc.

PWA applications allow you to solve a wide range of tasks:

• Unobtrusively get to the user’s device without using application stores.
• Make the resource available offline, which is especially important for online stores. Even if the client does not have the Internet, he can still add the products he likes to the cart. As soon as the Internet connection is restored, it is enough to send your order.
• Increase the site loading speed on mobile devices by creating a cache.
• Send information about products, services, promotions to users who have installed the application, saving on advertising.
• Increase brand recognition by displaying the company icon on the main screen of the gadget.

PWA applications: pros and cons

PWA technology has many obvious advantages, thanks to which the technology has become more popular in recent years:

• The PWA application sends the user important reminders and messages about new products, promotions, which makes it possible to save on advertising.
• Developing and maintaining a PWA using modern web technologies is much more profitable than creating native applications for Android and IOs.
• There is no need to develop a native application, register it in the Play Market or AppStore. When visiting the company’s website, the user will receive an offer to install the PWA application on the home screen.
• Installation is carried out as quickly as possible in one click when the user visits the company’s website.
• Thanks to the cache, the application loads quickly and is available to the client in offline mode.
• A PWA is small in size (usually under 1 MB) unlike native applications, which often take up 200 MB or more.

Along with a huge number of advantages, PWA applications have several disadvantages. Gadgets with Safari installed by default do not receive push notifications. But in iOs 14 versions, the option to choose a browser appeared. If you choose Safari as the default browser, push notifications will be sent.

At the moment, PWA apps do not work with Touch id, and they also work with Bluetooth to a limited extent. Taking into account the fact that Progressive Web apps began to enjoy increased demand not so long ago, in the near future, developers will probably manage to eliminate this shortcoming.

What are MPA applications?

Along with progressive applications, there are other web technologies for business that are no less popular: SPA and MPA. SPA is a single-page web application with dynamic update, which is achieved thanks to the capabilities of JavaScript: Ember, React, Angular. MPA – multi-page applications that work according to a similar scheme.

MPAs are much “heavier” than SPAs, so they are suitable only for sites that require a large amount of content to be displayed.

Advantages of MPA applications:

• Ease of SEO optimization thanks to the ability to select relevant key queries for each page of the program.
• Convenience for users thanks to the familiar interface and classic navigation.

The most significant disadvantage of MPA applications is the complexity of development compared to PWA, which increases the time and budget, as well as the close connection between the backend and frontend, which makes it impossible to develop them in parallel.

Recently, PWA applications have begun to displace classic MPAs from their positions. The reason is that PWAs are easier to develop, work very quickly, and therefore are more liked by users. The weakest point of progressive applications compared to the usual and reliable MPAs is SEO optimization, because PWAs do not work with every browser, but with the right approach, the problem can be minimized.

Examples of implementing PWA applications

Successful examples of the implementation of PWA applications show how important and useful they are for business:

• The Washington Post, thanks to the use of PWA technology, managed to increase visits by 12%, and page loading takes no more than 0.8 seconds.
• The popular store Walmart managed to increase the number of visits up to 28%.
• Book My Show, a well-known Indian company with an audience of 50 million, increased conversion by 80%.
• After the introduction of PWA in Google Maps, the loading of maps was significantly accelerated, they became available in offline mode, which made it possible to increase user loyalty.
• The global leader AliExpress, which was already experiencing no shortage of customers, increased conversion by 104% after implementing PWA.

Progressive Web Apps is a modern technology that allows any site to add application functionality with minimal costs, increase productivity and improve behavioral factors. Google is actively promoting this technology, which in the future will have a positive effect on the ranking of sites in search and will enable you to promote your business even more actively. If you have not yet created a PWA application for your site, now is the time to do it, and the positive results will not make you wait.