When to Choose Native Development: Key App Strategy Insights

At Very Good Ventures (VGV), we believe that selecting the right technology for a mobile application is about finding the best fit for each team’s unique needs, capabilities, and long-term goals. While multi-platform frameworks like Flutter provide significant advantages in efficiency and productivity, there are still cases where native development can be the right path forward to fully leverage platform-specific features and optimizations.

For us, the focus isn’t on choosing one approach over the other but on understanding when and how each technology best supports specific business and technical needs. The most successful digital products are built on tailored solutions, not strict technological preferences.

As our offerings and clientele have expanded over the years, we recognized the need to provide comprehensive, end-to-end solutions tailored to each project’s unique requirements. To meet this demand, our team’s expertise also excels in native development services built on the same best engineering practices that have made VGV an industry leader in multi-platform development.

Whether native or multi-platform, our goal remains the same: high performance, delightful user experience, and long-term scalability. 

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Growing Our Native Capabilities

Last year, I joined VGV at an exciting time of growth, as we expanded our service offerings to bring the "VGV Way" to even more areas of our clients' technology ecosystems.

Since then, our native mobile capabilities have continued to grow, and we've worked on exciting projects that showcase our deep expertise in the field. 

Learn more about why VGV is expanding into native app development in this blog post.

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If your app requires a lot of deep platform integrations, has specific hardware performance requirements, or must reflect the latest native look and feel guidelines, a native approach may be worth the additional investment in order to deliver the experience you want for your users.

In this article, I’ll highlight some common scenarios where you might want to consider native development—and yes, at VGV, we’ve also got you covered there. 

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1. Direct Access to Platform APIs‍

One of the most significant advantages of native development is immediate and unrestricted access to all native platform APIs. When Apple or Google releases new system features or optimizations, native applications can instantly leverage them without waiting for third-party framework support.

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Examples of applications that can benefit from this include:

• Apps that require deep integration with device hardware, such as cameras, GPS, biometrics, or augmented reality (ARKit/ARCore).
• Specialized platform experiences, like Android Launchers and WatchOS applications.

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2. In-App Performance Optimizations

In many cases, multi-platform solutions are able to match the in-app performance of a native application. However, for apps that require high-performance rendering, complex animations, or real-time data processing, you might start to see a difference. Building natively allows for platform-specific optimizations that can help minimize latency and maximize responsiveness—crucial for experiences such as:

• Video editing or AR applications with intensive rendering needs.
• Apps that handle large amounts of real-time data or computational processing.
• Low-latency games.

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3. A Native Look & Feel for Each Platform

If your app needs to perfectly match the UI standards of the target platform, native development allows you to use the full suite of platform-specific UI components to create an engaging and integrated experience. This ensures that your app follows the latest design patterns, interactions, and behaviors expected by users on each OS.
This is important for:

• Apps that must behave and feel like a natural extension of iOS or Android
• Ensuring platform consistency across all devices and versions of the platform-specific ecosystem (i.e., be consistent across all Apple devices).

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4. Devices with Limited Resources

Not all devices are created equal. Wearables, smart TVs, and embedded systems often have limited CPU, RAM, and storage, making efficiency a top priority. Native development allows you to:

• Minimize the app size for faster downloads and better battery life.
• Optimize memory and CPU usage to prevent crashes or slowdowns.

 This is highly relevant for:

• Wearables, IoT devices, or any application running on constrained hardware.
• Apps targeting regions with expensive mobile data costs, where download size impacts adoption.

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5. Legacy Codebases & Existing Infrastructure

For teams with large existing native codebases, transitioning to a multi-platform approach may not always be feasible due to timing, cost (training, tooling changes, etc.), or compatibility concerns. In these cases, native development ensures continuity and stability while still allowing for future hybrid or cross-platform integrations.

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Native is often considered for the following scenarios:

• Businesses with significant investments in native technology.
• Apps requiring gradual modernization without a complete rewrite.
• When there are significant amounts of pre-existing platform-specific code and libraries that must be re-used
• Apps requires usage of third-party services that only have native SDKs

However, even in these cases, we strongly recommend conducting an assessment to identify opportunities for embracing Flutter in the future.

Let’s Find the Right Strategy for Your Business

‍At VGV, we apply the same engineering principles, best practices, and performance-driven approach to native mobile development as we do in our industry-leading multiplatform work.

Whether you’re building a fully native app, optimizing an existing codebase, or exploring a hybrid approach, our team ensures you get the best possible performance, scalability, and maintainability—regardless of the platform.

If you have any questions or are looking for advice to help make the right technology choice, I’d love to connect and discuss!

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