Do you need an app, or would a PWA do the same job for less?

"We need an app" might be the most expensive sentence in small business. Sometimes it's true. Often, though, what people really need is for their existing website to behave like an app, which is a very different and far cheaper thing to build. So before you commit to a native app, understand the choice properly.

What a native app costs you

A native app means building for iOS and Android. Usually two separate codebases. Then you have to get through Apple and Google's review processes, and keep maintaining all of it as the operating systems shift underneath you. It also means convincing people to open an app store and install the thing, which most won't do for a business they've just found. A lot of cost. A lot of friction. All before anyone has used it.

What a PWA gives you instead

A progressive web app is a website that behaves like an app. One tap adds it to the home screen. It opens full screen with your icon, it loads fast, and it carries on working when the signal drops out. No app store. No download. No review process. One codebase instead of two. For a lot of businesses, that is genuinely all "we need an app" ever meant.

When you actually do need native

I won't pretend a PWA is always the answer. If you need deep access to phone hardware, heavy offline data, tight integration with other native apps, or you're building a product where being in the app store is the whole point, then native is the right call. I'll tell you if that's you. But for a shop, a booking tool, a members area or a field-work tool, a PWA usually does the job for a fraction of the money.

How to decide

The honest test is one question: what do you need the app to do that your website can't already do on a phone? If the answer is "feel like an app and work offline," that's a PWA. Something deeper? It might be native, and that is worth a proper conversation before you spend a penny.

This is the work I do most. It's in the name. You can see more on the PWA development page, or book a free 30-minute surgery and I'll tell you straight which one your business actually needs.