In the battle between mobile web and mobile app, there is no doubt that mobile apps have come out on the top. Today, native apps are in so much boom that almost every small and large business prefers to have a mobile app.

According to statista, 6000+ mobile apps are launched every day for Android and 1400+ apps for iOS platform every day. But, these businesses still face challenges in acquiring new users as survey revealed that 53% users stay away from downloading any new apps.

To combat this, businesses have started adopting Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) to reach broader audience in the market.

PWAs are web applications that are basically websites or web pages that can appear as a traditional native application. These Progressive Web Apps combine the capabilities of both mobile native apps and mobile websites to create an immersive user experience and improve overall engagement as well as conversion rate.

Why Progressive Web Apps are Essential for Your Business?

In this article we’re going to take a look at key benefits of PWAs to discover why they’re essential for businesses.

1 — App-Like Feeling

The best feature of a PWA that we would like to highlight is that they give users an exact app-like experience, while also providing all website features such as access to database and dynamic data.

Progressive web apps allow users to operate in similar settings of a mobile app as well as mobile website. They allow users to check updates and other details that works like website but feels like a mobile app.

2 — Offline Mode

This is the era of Internet and everything can stop when the Internet stops working. Even with Internet, sometimes it cannot display complete and proper websites. With progressive web apps, however, that’s not the case.

PWAs come with an offline mode in which users can make changes without internet connection and those changes are still saved automatically.

3 — No Install & Download Required

Unlike native mobile apps, progressive web apps do not require users to go through Google Play Store or Apple App Store and wait for the app to download and then install.

Businesses also do not need to go through app submission process. PWAs does not require to be published on App Stores. Users can directly download these apps easily with links.

Businesses can just share the links of their PWA to various channels using which users can install and use the app instantly without having to go to the app store.

4 — Enhanced Performance

Compared to native mobile apps, progressive web apps are much more faster. Even in an unstable network, progressive web apps have proven to provide a seamless experience.

In fact, Forbes recently adopted PWA and revealed that their impression increased 10% per session as it loads in just 2.5 seconds while the previous site was taking 6.5 seconds. And according to a report, users bounce from a website when it takes more than 3 seconds to load.

5 — PWA Support Push Notification Functionality

Just like native apps, PWA too have push notifications capability. This functionality can be performed in different ways which allows businesses to get the best of their content advertising.

In fact, according to a statistics, nearly 60% of users allow progressive web apps to send them notifications regarding an offer, which increases opportunities for businesses to promote their services and products.

Now, if these benefits don’t look promising enough to you, take a look at how industry leaders have leveraged progressive web apps and results they’ve received till now.

Top Industry Leaders Using PWAs

Many leaders of different industries have already got splendid results by adopting progressive web apps. And all the credit goes to the capabilities and benefits of PWA.

1 — Twitter Lite

One of the most popular social media platform currently has 330+ million users in which nearly 80% are on mobile.

In 2017, Twitter adopted PWA and built Twitter Lite, which is available in 45 countries today. The PWA version of Twitter takes up only 3 MB space in Android and 1 MB in iOS.

This new release apparently came as a surprise to Twitter’s users and provided benefits like less data consumption and loads seamlessly in 2G and 3G networks.

The result?

• 60% increase in page sessions
• 20% decrease in bounce rates
• 75% increase in number of tweets

2 — Ola

Ola is a leading taxi aggregator in India who could not sacrifice in their mobile app experience. And since majority of users in India deal with slow internet speed and limited device storage issue, Ola understood that they need to come up with a better solution to serve these users.

Hence, Ola built a light-weight PWA suitable for all devices and internet speed.

The Results?

• 20% increase in new users
• 30% increase in conversion rates
• 68% increase in mobile traffic

3 — Alibaba

Alibaba is world’s fifth largest B2B marketplace with 617 million monthly mobile users.

For these users, Alibaba provides a strong mobile experience with their native mobile app. But, they recently realized the flaws of their mobile app. They discovered that their mobile users rather prefer a quick solution instead of downloading a high space consuming app.

So to prevent these users from leaving, Alibaba built a progressive web apps, providing fast, reliable, and engaging experience.

The results?

• 4 Times higher interaction rate
• 76% increase in mobile web conversions
• 14% more monthly iOS users & 30% more monthly Android users

Conclusion? — Progressive Web Apps are Game Changer for Businesses

Progressive web apps are the next step after the native mobile apps. And from benefits that it provides, we can say without any doubt that businesses that are opting for progressive web app development are choosing the path of their success.

This article is contributed by Nasrullah Patel, Co-founded at Peerbits — web application development company.

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