The top ten SDK-based apps and tools.
In the middle of the 2010s, mobile devices outnumbered computers to become the largest category of devices connected to the Internet. Therefore, in order to provide the best possible user experience, it is essential to create mobile applications that are responsive, powerful, and functional.
Developers and publishers can get the tools and features they need to create apps with the highest ratings by using top-performing mobile SDKs.
What’s an SDK?
A Software Development Kit (SDK), also known as a dev kit, is a set of pre-built software tools and features that can be used by app developers to create new applications.
By providing ready-made code libraries, APIs, and other essential elements, SDKs enable developers to save time while developing a program or application without having to code bespoke solutions from scratch.
Apps developed with SDKs are most frequently found in the mobile market, despite the fact that SDKs are not exclusive to the mobile landscape (for instance, many desktop PC and Mac applications were built using SDKs).
Mobile SDK app and tool framework types.
Developers can create a wide variety of applications using application SDKs, which fall into three broad categories: hybrid apps, native apps, and web apps.
1. Native software.
Native applications are mobile applications that are made specifically to run on a particular operating system. Native app SDKs are grouped by mobile operating system in the context of mobile applications. SDKs for Android app development, Windows Phone app development, and Apple iOS app development are just a few examples.
In most cases, native applications can only be used with one operating system. For instance, no Apple iOS device can run an Android application, such as an.apk file.
Some SDKs allow developers to create applications that are only compatible with a specific range of version numbers, especially in the case of long-running operating systems that have been updated and iterated on for many years.
2. Web apps
Web applications may appear to have the same features as native apps, but they don’t run on the user’s device. A web app, on the other hand, is an advanced, application-like website that runs in a web browser. A web app has its own interface that adjusts to the device and web browser of the user.
Programming languages like HTML5, Javascript, Ruby, PHP, Python, and Perl are among the technologies and SDKs used to create web apps. These technologies and SDKs are comparable to those needed to create websites.
3. Applications that are hybrid.
In order to strike a balance between performance and ease of maintenance, hybrid applications offer a technological bridge between native and web apps. At their core, hybrid apps are web apps enhanced with a variety of technologies and tools to bring their behavior and performance closer to native apps.
Hybrid apps, on the other hand, might access device features like the microphone, cameras, or accelerometer, have app icons similar to those of native apps, provide either partial or complete offline functionality, or both.
As a result, the SDKs that are used to create a hybrid app typically include a mix of tools and libraries that can be used in both web apps and native apps. React Native, Flutter, and Ionic are three examples of programming frameworks.
The top ten best SDK tools and apps.
Utilizing industry-standard SDKs, the majority of the best-performing applications currently available for app stores and web browsers were developed. The top ten SDKs of today are as follows:
1. The best ad network SDK: AdMob SDK (Google Mobile Ads SDK)
The official Google AdMob development kit is the Google Mobile Ads SDK. The Google Mobile Ads SDK is made to be used with Android and iOS applications. It lets developers use Google Ads to make money from their apps. Accessing Google’s extensive advertiser network and generating revenue with your application are the primary goals of this SDK.
One of the most widely used dev kits in the mobile market as a whole is the Google AdMob SDK, which is used by over 1.65 million apps (1.38 million on Google Play and over 270,000 on the Apple App Store).
2. The best communication SDK: OneSignal.
The OneSignal SDK, which is available for Android, iOS, Huawei, and the web, is the most popular Software Development Kit for integrating communications channels into an application.
A notification service for native, web, and hybrid apps is OneSignal. Developers can use the service’s powerful OneSignal API to send push notifications, native (in-app) messages, and even SMS and email messages. OneSignal is used by over 325,000 applications, or 57% of all applications that use a communication SDK.
3. The best social SDK: SDK for Facebook.
An efficient strategy for the monetization of digital property may necessitate the use of social media platforms. Facebook is currently the most widely used social media platform. The Facebook SDK contains software and tools for app developers to use the platform’s extensive ad network and audience targeting solutions to monetize apps.
An application can, for instance, incorporate a Facebook login page by utilizing Facebook SDK components.
For Android, Apple iOS and TVOS, as well as web programming languages (such as PHP and JavaScript), the Facebook SDK is available. With over 527,000 apps on Google Play and over 288,000 apps on the Apple App Store integrating its features and components, it has the largest market share of social SDKs.
4. Marketing Analytics and Attribution’s Best SDK: AppsFlyer.
SDKs for marketing analytics and attribution contain APIs and tools that allow applications to record marketing activity and performance. This kind of functionality is typically incorporated into applications by programmers for the purposes of calculating acquisition rates, collecting and managing customer data, and assessing the success of marketing campaigns.
With an app share of 33% and a download share of 53% on Android, AppsFlyer is the most popular marketing analytics and attribution development kit for web, Android, and iOS applications. Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is the business model used by AppsFlyer, which provides its functionality entirely online through a subscription model.
5. The best UX optimization SDK: UserExperior.
An essential aspect of any mobile application is the user experience (UX). However, because overall experiences are frequently subjective, measuring and quantifying user experience and satisfaction while using a mobile application can be challenging.
But UX optimization SDKs like UserExperior can help break down an experience into quantifiable parts, measure the most important parts of an app’s usability, and give developers and publishers information that they can use.
6. The best mobile commerce SDK: In-App Payment through Google Play
SDKs for mobile commerce are mostly used to integrate billing and payment systems into mobile applications. Mobile commerce SDK tools are useful for eCommerce apps, but many games also use them to make premium purchase transactions easier.
Google Play In-App Billing, which enables developers to directly integrate Google Play’s pay interface into applications and games, is the mobile commerce SDK that is utilized the most frequently. This SDK can only be used on Android because it is made to work with apps on Google Play.
7. The best eCommerce SDK: CleverTap.
APIs and functions to measure and improve customer engagement, conversion rates, retention rates, and other important eCommerce KPIs are typically included in software development kits for eCommerce applications.
The most widely used development kit for real-time tracking of eCommerce KPIs and customer insights is the CleverTap SDK. Both Android and iOS users can access this SDK.
8. Best SDK for Analyzing User Data: Firebase from Google
The numerous insights and data points that general-purpose user analytics provide about an application’s users enable app developers and publishers to adjust and improve the app’s performance accordingly.
At the moment, Google Firebase is the most popular data analytics development kit. The Firebase SDK, which is powered by Google’s well-known analytics technology and found in over 2.26 million Android and iOS applications, is one of the most widely used mobile development tools. The Firebase SDK is used by 93% of applications on Google Play alone.
9. Best Data Intelligence SDK: AltBeacon.
App developers can integrate functions and tools for obtaining, processing, and interpreting sensor and location data with the help of data intelligence devkits. For retail and eCommerce applications, one of the most common uses for this kind of SDK is to collect user location data.
With an Android app share of 14% and over 2.61 billion app downloads, AltBeacon is one of the most widely used data intelligence SDKs in today’s mobile app landscape. Advertising via Bluetooth proximity beacon broadcasts is made possible by this SDK, which makes use of Radius Networks’ AltBeacon Specification.
10. The most stable SDK: Fabric of Google Firebase Crashlytics
While the majority of software development kits (SDKs) are made to help developers build or improve app features, other SDKs focus on app performance and dependability. Devkits, APIs, and tools designed to measure an application’s health and performance (such as the number, type, and frequency of crashes) are all included in the stability SDK category. and make certain it performs as expected.
The most popular stability SDK is Google Firebase’s Crashlytics Fabric SDK. It gives mobile app developers real-time monitoring of app stability issues and features for easy triage and prioritization, allowing them to choose what to fix and in what order to fix or restore an app’s functionality.
The advantages of utilizing SDK applications and tools for publishers.
Developing and optimizing mobile applications with Software Development Kits is extremely beneficial to publishers and developers. They have libraries with code that has already been written and tools that can help developers and publishers speed up application development.
As a result, these tools are essential for speeding up application development and releasing, updating, or scaling applications.
Reduced development times eliminate the need to program 100�spoke solutions for each application, which saves money and effort. In a nutshell, software development kits (SDKs) facilitate the development of apps and aid in maximizing revenue from app monetization channels.
