Mobile apps are constantly accelerating change in business operations, marketplaces, and attending customers. In a recent report by Statista, the total revenue earned by apps across stores is expected to reach a staggering $808 billion by 2022.
The app development industry is progressing rapidly and accommodating new trends, features, and user experience features. As we start this year, it is high time to take a closer look at the key trends that will significantly shape mobile app development.
While many new trends in mobile app development are emerging this year, here are the top mobile app development trends that we selected after elaborative, fact-based research.
Adoption of 5G
Tech giants have been incorporating 5G at full scale, and we see 5G-enabled devices in the market. By next year, we expect that 660 million smartphones will have 5G connection, which accounts for around 47.5% of all devices. Further development of this technology will boost the connection speed of mobile devices.
The development of 5G means better performance and speed for mobile apps. In 3G and 4G standards, data security is sometimes compromised. 5G is expected to answer the existing problem due to its more secure network. A solution like this will also significantly impact our daily communication.
Augmented and Virtual Reality (AR and VR)
Similar to 5G, AR and VR are already being used by several industry leaders. According to Statista, the worldwide market of AR and VR technology will rise from $27 billion in 2018 to about $209 billion in 2022.
This year, we will see AR & VR shaping the mobile app development industry in ways we can’t even imagine. A spike in the number of AR & VR users this year means that you have a great chance to leverage these mobile app development trends to bring game-changing experiences to users on mobile. The latest mobile app development trends include the employment of AR & VR to offer personalized experiences to the users.
AI and Machine Learning
In the hunt to deliver tailored user experiences for mobile apps, AI that uses predictive analytics and machine learning algorithms will be the key technologies to incorporate. AI is essential for navigation, speech recognition, and natural language processing (NLP). AI is also being used in facial recognition features on mobile phones. Behavioural algorithms can also enhance security by analysing user behaviours and detecting fraud, suspicious activities, and potential information breaches. More and more app development companies are incorporating this feature to improve user security.
Mobile apps for video chats
Mobile communicators have become popular this pandemic – thanks to remote working. They no longer serve as a facility for communicating at a distance with family. It also facilitates better work organisation and the possibility of online teaching. Video communication is also used in medicine. E-consultations are now as popular as routine visits to doctors. This form of diagnosis allows effective treatment of patients with non-life-threatening symptoms. People can thus save time waiting for clinics.
Modern video communication apps can make the interaction between people even simpler. This is one of the challenges facing developers in the coming year. The last two years have shown how much demand there is for talking platforms – both private and public. That is why 2022 will provide many resolutions in this area.
Mobile Commerce
As more shoppers prefer to buy online, more retailers build native apps or progressive web apps (PWAs) to provide a better shopping experience. E-commerce stores have already shifted to mobile commerce apps. Since most customers access web stores through their mobile devices, online retailers turn to mobile apps to boost customer loyalty, footfall, and business conversion. This year, mobile commerce apps will finally replace the eCommerce stores accessible through mobile browsers.
Progressive Web Apps and “Instant” Apps
PWAs are a hybrid between web pages and apps. One of the best benefits of these apps is that they take less time to develop than standard apps because they are simply websites with app functionalities. They are becoming more prevalent because they fill in the gaps left by most native apps and web pages. Benefits like eased dependency on internet connections, faster loading times, automatic updates, and shorter development times make PWAs a favoured choice for consumers and companies.
Wearables
Wearables are another way to bring convenience to your users: the ability to receive notifications and messages on consumers’ smartwatches is one of its highest-ranking functions. According to Statista, there will be about 1.1 billion connected wearable devices in 2022 worldwide. Within the wearable market, fitness tracking has seen a positive and upward trend in demand with the rise in health awareness of the general consumer population.
Blockchain
One of the many new trends in mobile app development is blockchain technology. Security and data misuse has always been a big concern among app users. Blockchain fixes these issues through its provision of decentralised databases.
The apps backed by this technology are end-to-end encrypted, so no one company or a person reserves rights over the data or can modify the data. Blockchain is the future for more secure digital transactions and the exchange of sensitive user data.
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With COVID-19 further accelerating the trend for consumers to move much of their lives online, there is a new push to deliver more personalised experiences to every consumer. The mobile app development trends for 2022 reflect this digital transformation and focus on user satisfaction. Incorporating applicable trends into your mobile app’s feature roadmap will set you up for success into the new year and beyond.