Android and iOS are two of the most popular mobile platforms used today. This is the reason why you can see several applications specifically developed for these platforms only. While both are hot, a comparison of the sales figures of the two shows Android to be in the front. However, the ranking order may look different when these operating systems are looked at from an App developer’s perspective.
Some important factors for an application developer to consider are accessibility, learning curve, memory management, profits, and inherent advantages presented by a platform. Let us compare Android and iOS on these parameters.
Accessibility: If you want to develop apps for iOS, you need a Mac. Android Software Development, on the other hand, gives you freedom in terms of the operating system. Android SDK can be installed on Windows, Linux, as well as Mac. Android is an open source platform and is used on a wide range of devices, whereas iOS can only be installed on Apple devices. Therefore, as you can see, Android clearly offers more flexibility than iOS.
Learning Curve: Java is the programming language used for developing Android apps. Objective-C is the programming language used to develop apps for iOS. Java is a popular language, and you can find many Java code samples on the Internet. Besides, Java’s popularity exists beyond Android development, and the majority of the developers know Java. This, however, is not true in case of Objective-C. Developers need to learn Objective-C to develop apps for iOS. As a result, the learning curve for developing apps for iOS is higher in comparison to Android.
Memory Management: Efficient memory management is essential for better functioning of the apps. Memory management can become a tedious task for app developers. Android presents automatic memory management through Garbage collector. Objective-C also offers safe memory management through Automatic Reference Counting (ARC). Many developers have an opinion that ARC handles memory management better than Garbage Collector does. Here, iOS app developers gain with better memory management tools.
Software development kit: A software development kit (SDK) is essential for app development. It does away with the need to own a device to build an app for it. Apple offers iOS SDK while Android developers have Android SDK. iOS SDK contains simulator while Android SDK contains an emulator. Android emulator can mimic both software and hardware, but the iOS simulator can only mimic software. With Android SDK, you can specify exact hardware requirements to the emulator such as memory, which is not possible with iOS SDK. However, iOS SDK is fast, and you can test and debug the code quickly while the Android emulator is slow in processing. Thus, the iOS SDK clearly scores more when it comes to overall application development.
Fragmentation: Fragmentation is a serious issue for apps developers. Android app developers face the highest threat of fragmentation issues due to diverging variants of the platform. The fragmentation issue leads to app not working correctly on some devices. iOS developers do not face significant fragmentation issue. This is because Apple device owners can quickly upgrade to new iOS.
Profits: The number of Android devices sold is greater than Apple devices running iOS. However, if you look at the revenue generated, iOS developers earn more revenue as Apple device owners are ready to spend more to purchase apps. On the other hand, Android apps are mostly distributed free, and the revenue generated through ads is not significant.