Technique for Optimizing & Reducing the APK size of Android App

Today everyone hates running their phones out of space or having trouble while uploading their app on the App Store. So what is the problem behind this! Is your phone running low on memory or slow enough to execute the upload process? No! The real problem is with the application of larger sizes.

Certainly, Size has been affected by increasing the mobile storage space to 256 GB, mobile app size is also increasing as App Developers are starting to add the latest features to the app to meet the growing and changing needs and needs of the market. Furthermore, with the practice of supporting your apps on different screen sizes, the app size increases. As a result, the increasing number of features added to the app, the SDK, changes to higher resolution images, better graphics which makes the SDK size larger.

With all these facts, it becomes a situation for users, as if they cannot proceed with heavy apps on their screen, nor get rid of them. In addition, they remain in a love-and-hate relationship with these apps. On one hand, rich graphics, hassle-free navigation, a bundle of advanced features steal users’ hearts. On the other hand, these apps are crushing the huge size of their mobile storage space. According to the latest survey report, 74.4% of the world’s people use Android devices and 70% of users consider the size of the app before installing it on their device.

Effectiveness of APK size on Installation Conversion Rate

The Android package (APK) size server plays a major role in establishing the conversion rate. According to various studies and survey reports, it has been concluded that smaller APK sizes depend on higher conversion rates and conversely reflect translation. As most Mobile App Development companies are shifting their focus towards venturing into new emerging markets by adding some advanced features and functionalities to their app. But at the same time, it is important to be aware of increasing the size of your app.

App size is the Biggest Issue in the Mobile App Development Domain

If we look at Google’s figures and consider it, 84.8% of people using Android in 2020 are expected to jump to 85.7% in 2024 compared to 15.2% of iOS users in 2020. The global user base is 2.7 billion with access to 2.8 million applications in the Google Play Store. Adding to this, the SDK size and installation conversion rate are intimately correlated. According to Google, if the app size is more than 150 MB, installation is likely to be less than 30%. For every 6 MP expansion in application size, the installation conversion will be reduced by 1%.

Since the above data shows that the size of the APK badly affects the installation conversion rate, all Android app developers should be serious about this matter because 70% of the users are actually on the app’s size before installing it. Let’s consider. So while hiring a mobile app developer for your next project, keep in mind that there is no benefit to having an app that has no users.

Before we dig deeper to understand how to reduce the size of Android app during the development life cycle, it is worth understanding how the app size increases.

App size continues to grow & is becoming a cautious issue for Android developers

Indeed, modern day apps are stealing the show by adding an excellent level of correct management facility to everything from taps on your screen. But uncertainty, these apps are severely shaped for these three reasons:

Increasing number of feature sets.
Fast growing UX expectations.
Support for multiple platforms and different screen sizes.

Apart from affecting the storage capacity and memory of mobile devices, the most disappointing part about heavy apps is also the increase in data consumption. And this is the reason that is inspiring the users to uninstall the app. So, whether you are a leading brand trying to deliver an excellent user experience through an app, you need to emphasize on making smaller apps. Don’t worry, Google always has a way of dealing with these issues. It provides tools to develop to troubleshoot the problem. So let’s discuss how to reduce and reduce the size of Android apps.

Tips to reduce Android app size throughout development lifecycle

Optimize & Compress of Image Files

Browsing an app with high-resolution graphics is quite inspiring and interesting. But, be aware, heavy-sized images can slow down your app and increase the size of your app. So what to do if you want to optimize and reduce the image size without diluting the image resolution?

Basically, Images use two formats, either .jpeg or .png files. So whether you are going to compress the file on your own or hire an Android app developer for the same, there are many tools available for such conversions. Tools such as Guetzli and packjpg are recommended for .jpg file compression, while pngcrush and zopflipng support .png files.

Few More Option for Optimize & Reduce the Image Size

Designers can apply vector graphics to create simple resolution-independent images that do not have much space. It is available in Android as readily available objects that make it easier by allowing you to generate sharp and screen-size images under a 100-byte file. This can be a great idea for smaller size applications to reduce the size of the image

By adding this, developers can use the Draw 9-Patch tool or the WYSIWYG image editor, allowing you to create bitmap images and auto-resize to fit different screen sizes of different devices. To crunch the size of .png images, you can take advantage of the aapt tool, which is available in Res / drawable and allows you to shade the shape.

Eradication of Unutilized Process, Codes, Classes and Virtue

When developing a mobile app, it is common to have unusable code and resources in an unusable system. These codes are generated automatically and are not useful for the app at all, but they simply expand the app’s size rapidly. Since they do not add any value to your app, it makes sense to track them down and remove unnecessary code from your app immediately. And for this, you can benefit by using some tools and techniques, which we are talking about below:

RB Code Shrinker Tool

When it comes to reducing or shrinking app size, most software development companies usually leverage the knowledge of this tool. Code shrinking allows you to reduce the size of your APK by automatically removing unused code and resources from the system.

Eliminate your Code with ProGuard

Since R8 is comparatively new and still in a growing state, you may prefer to use ProGuard to remove unused classes, methods, fields, and attributes from your code until it becomes stable. Can. However, be careful when using ProGuard because sometimes it removes the code that your app needs to function. So you always have to test the functionality of your app first to publish it.

Scan your Codes with Android Lint

Lint is a static code scanning tool that cannot identify the necessary resources anywhere in your code. But the major issue with the use of lint is that it only identifies unused resources, and cannot remove these resources. So you will need to check its report and extract all the identified resources manually.

Elimination of Dead Codes

As the size of the APK file is directly in sync with the loading speed of the app, it devours the storage of your device, making it clear that it is powered by power. And will only add bulk to any unused and inactive code for your app. By removing extra and dead code, you can speed up your application without affecting the functionality of the app. By adding this, eliminating these codes helps you to upgrade the quality of the source code and reduce the need to maintain code size. Therefore, the scope of bugs in your application is prevented and allows you to introduce bug-free healthy apps.

Limitation the use of Resources from Libraries

It is common to use external libraries when developing Android applications to enhance the user experience and increase versatility in the app. And basic are Google Play services used primarily to recover auto translation of app text and Android support libraries that are used to enhance the user experience on dated devices.

Basically, the problem is that most of these libraries are designed for servers or desktops, so they come with heavy methods and objects and do not serve any purpose for your application. To reduce the size of the application, you can edit files and keep the parts that your app needs to function. But to make changes, you will need access to the modification. But the simple solution to this problem is to either hire an app developer or use a mobile-friendly library for specific functionalities.

Use Android Size Analyzer Plugin

If you want to find out what exactly is in your app, you can either hire an App Development Company or take advantage of the Android Analyzer plugin to analyze every element of your app. It tries to help you with a lot of data about the size of the Android package. In fact, it is one of the easiest ways to determine and implement methods that will cause app size reduction and allow you to activate your app.

Use Android Pleasure Size with APK Analyzer, you can:

Understand the structure of DEX files.
See the correct size of files in the APK.
By accelerated view of the ending version of the files in the APK.
Compare two APKs simultaneously.

Now there are three ways to access this plugin during project development:

It is necessary to first drag an APK into Android Studio’s editor window.
Switch to project perspective in project window
First select the Build Analyze APK in the menu bar, and only then select your APK.

Conclusion

Hopefully, with this blog, you have an idea that large-sized applications fail to stand out in the market despite giving users unique features. Whether you are developing an application for your core business or for additional services, it is always necessary to have a user-friendly application that meets the growing needs of the market.

And, optimizing and reducing app size is the only way to make your app user friendly. Thus, following the techniques described above will definitely help you reduce the size of the app and make it successful. But if you still have any doubts or difficulty coming down, you can hire Android app developers to build an application with the ideal size.

Our experts can guide you with the best solutions, new trends and techniques that enable you to stand out in a competitive market. For more information, you can contact our portfolio and us for detailed discussion and accurate estimates.

May 10, 2021May 10, 2021

Develop a GPS Navigation App Similar to the Waze

Navigation apps are becoming highly popular these days. Location-based service usage continues to increase today, and the number of such users in the future was predicted long ago. So, if you too are planning to build a GPS navigation app, then you are on the right track.

Accordingly to the BIS Research Agency report, the market for navigation apps is constantly evolving, with an expected revenue of $ 34.56 billion by 2021. Therefore, having a navigation app can greatly benefit your business. Waze and Google Maps are two of the most well-known apps for both Android and iOS in the region. They provide turn-by-turn directions, lots of real-time data, and other features that make them more attractive.

What is the Waze?

Waze is a high-end GPS navigation app that has some entertaining and useful features. It is the second top rated mobile app among users beaten only by Google Maps. This allows users to receive real-time traffic updates, use live maps and other road information.

Waze was the second most popular map app in the United States in April 2018. In 2020, a research report revealed its 130 million monthly active user results. Waze’s annual revenue is estimated at $ 37.7 million.

How Does the Waze Function?

Global users use Waze to enhance each other’s routes by sharing real-time data about road repairs and traffic conditions. The waze provides information about other important people like police nets, accidents, weather conditions, blocked roads etc. and keeps you informed about it from time to time. This app quickly assesses this data to ensure that others can locate the last routes. There are a large number of taxi booking apps such as the Waze Lyft app, for which the official navigation app is used for booking.

Waze differs from traditional GPS navigation apps because it is community-driven, collecting traffic data and supplementary map data from its users. Whenever the app is running, it collects data. It must have accurate data from each road to offer the least route. At the time of your driving, the app will compare every possible route information and provide the final route to your liking. You need an active Internet connection for loading routes because Waze does not work offline. To keep the map updated and secure real-time traffic data, you need an Internet connection.

In-app location-based advertising is Waze’s own advertising product. It is a location-directed advertising platform for businesses that needs to attract the attention of nearby drivers. While driving, you can see advertisements for nearby eateries, shops and other areas.

The most important fact is that if you use Waze, it not only informs the location of the area you are in but also gives the most above-mentioned results of your destination. This map app has created a system where any local business can send local advertisements and targeted messages to people who are driving nearby and searching for a location.

Important Features of a GPS Navigation App like Waze

Before developing a Waze-like GPS navigation app, let’s take a look at the key features to implement:

Authority

It is an important part of an app like waze. After the registration process, users get their personal accounts, through this account users can voluntarily review and enter notes as well as communicate with others. You can either log in using your email and password or connect to a social account like Facebook.

Payment Services

A GPS navigation app can incorporate in-app purchases as a monetization method. If your app becomes popular among drivers and those who provide complementary services, then there is a possibility of a partnership.

Real-Time Updates

A navigation app is good enough to have high-quality satellite images, but Ways do something else. Real-time updates from other users create a highly useful user experience. In addition, you can upload pictures and add notes to provide completely accurate data.

Carpool Service

The Waze-like carpool app enables drivers to receive free gas. If a user is going in the same direction, you can see it on your screen. Drivers and riders share gas expenses for the trip. The ride fee is decided in advance at a rate recommended by a waze-like app. The app automatically charges the credit card of users’ bank accounts.

In-App Message

If you want to design your waze-like navigation app, think about displaying user messages more attractively. Do you want to distribute them as push notifications or send them to chat? This can be done for navigation apps when the user enters a particular area or location.

Voice Navigation

Drivers should not be distracted by a map. Turn-by-turn navigation is an essential feature and the mobile GPS navigation app is nothing without it. Voice navigation helps drivers listen to directions such as where or which route to use, traffic alerts, and they have a better route in terms of information. If voice navigation distracts you, you can turn it off.

Social Network Integration

You need to integrate your app with social platforms for authentication and to offer social features. Moreover, social network integration improves the user experience and reduces security risks around authentication as most of the potential problems and vulnerabilities have already persisted. Also, you will not force users to create another account, but use their current accounts for seamless login.

Recurrence

Your GPS navigation app requires drivers who stumble into a road accident or drive in the wrong direction to run faster which prevents them from following basic directions. Drivers do not need to wait long for your app to reorder the route; They get direct instructions.

Geolocation & Navigation

The map forms the basics of a navigation app. This user uses a GPS system to determine location, locate objects, and show the route. To minimize mistakes, you can incorporate cell ID functionality into your app, as it relies on information coming from mobile operators. If your team combines cell ID and GPS, the app’s geolocation services will be accurate.

Google calendar synchronization

Users of Waze-like apps can sync the app with Google Calendar for more viable visits. When the waze gets access to the calendar, it creates a list of upcoming appointments along with their regions. This is how your navigation app can navigate travelers to their previously entered areas.

Steps To Create a GPS Navigation App such as Waze Successful

If you want to create a navigation app like Waze, then you are going to follow the standard mobile development process. Here are its main stages:

Conduct a research

Do a thorough study of the project to identify its potential risks and weaknesses to increase its success. The team should create a checklist to ensure the quality of every stage of the planning, creation, testing and delivery of the app.

Select Your Tech Partner

You have to select an app development firm to develop your application. In this phase, you study, assess, and choose an organization to build a team with you to build your navigation app. Signing the NDA is an important part of this app development process.

Meet the needs of your target audience

These days, users want smart navigation. They want the app to not only talk about traffic jams but also about speed cameras for example. Modern intelligent apps should instruct drivers to access parking areas near their destinations that have adequate locations and display gas prices.

Add Gamification Features

Gamification features give users the right directions to return to your app and serve to encourage them to use the app correctly. Take the numeral system as an example. Users get points for various activities in the app, such as sharing road data or for kilometers driven from the app. These points can be compared with other drivers’ points.

Keep your app’s UI / UX design

Your app buttons should be visible and large enough so that drivers can find them and click them without any problems. Focus on native app functionality – the UI should include the necessary components when navigating.

Add Voice Directions

Voice instructions make navigation more secure as users are not distracted by looking at the mobile screen. Be sure to play the voice directions at the right time. When you complete this, users can follow them with no distraction – for example, looking at a mobile screen. The same goes for sending a lot of notifications at the time of navigation – users should not receive too many of them. App developers can use the Google Maps Direction API that allows users to select voice from the list and implement it.

Attach video during app publishing

For the convenience of the way Waze adds a video to the app when uploading a map app for review, if someone is doing it for the first time, the process of using the app is shown in the video. Without this video, Google or Apple can reject your app, saying that they don’t know why they should allow your app to play audio and play in the background.

Expense of Creating Apps Similar to the Waze

The cost of a GPS navigation app such as waze depends on many factors, such as the rates of the development agency, the number of facilities and the complexity of the project, etc. These types of cars are based on. If you want to keep the development process budget-friendly, start with a few small and easy things. For example, you can create MVP first. This will help you make a rough estimate.

Conclusion

Thus, a GPS navigation app helps people find a simple path to their destination, check the status of roads and report accidents. In addition, many companies seek the opportunity to engage with navigation app users through advertisements. However, if you want to build a navigation app like Waze, follow the recommendations in this blog and make your app famous among users.

February 4, 2021February 4, 2021

6 product planning mistakes companies should avoid

Mobile app development projects flounder due to several causes. Inferior UX design, No originality, unable to offer value could be chief reasons. But, usually product failure leads to a failed mobile app planning phase. These are six common mobile app planning errors and actionable tips to bypass them.

6 Usual Product Strategy Errors & Ways To Avoid Them

1. Consumes a lot of time to begin

Several mobile app projects take a lot of time to begin. This is not a very good sign. Creating a futuristic blueprint and offering existing business value is a tough balancing act to perform, and in several cases, companies fail to adapt quickly. Also, technological transformation is very tough to predict, making it nearly impossible to satisfy stakeholders to park their money in development projects for dealing with future scenarios. The longer you keep your idea with you, tougher it gets to totally define a functional and feasible framework for development.This can negatively impact your product’s prospects.

How to keep this at bay

One of the difficult aspects of the development process is to begin. To bypass a long drawn-out mobile app development and launch procedure, it’s ideal to put all your high-level information, research, and specifications in a single document by making a PRD. With a PRD as the basis of your project, you can easily communicate technical viability execution plans, and risk and change management strategies to all team members and stakeholders.

Also, it is a must to opt for an iterative, agile method and concentrate on rapid prototyping. With product needs turning very clear cut, focus your efforts on introducing a minimum viable product (MVP), and building and iterating off your learnings.

2. Coming with product devoid of user value

It’s very tough to ascertain which features and functionalities are essential for user value. Correspondingly, it’s not very convenient all the time to view the full range of technical prospects. The onus is on product team to take the customer through product requirements planning to find out the ideal development solution. A detailed product definition stage comprises developing customer requests into firm product specifications, which can be easily learnt by engineering. A PRD document has the propensity to shape your requests into a robust product specifications. Devoid of proper communication, you would not be able to find out the several consequences of features on product performance.

Way to avoid the same

Gauge the needs for creating a good product vis-a-vis your product beliefs. It’s pertinent to ponder critically over user assumptions, technical assumptions, and business assumptions. Your team has to have knowledge of the market, upcoming trends and technologies, and options for the product to specify the needs for a successful results.

3. Devising needs In A Vacuum

Products can be very complicated, including various systems, subsystems, and functionality; obviously, their needs are complex as well. The certain organizations suffer due to lack of diversity within the team. Product teams must have several people with various areas of expertise: product owners, product managers, developers, engineers, architects, and UX/UI designers etc. This makes sure that several perspectives and opinions come together to carve out a well-thought out product.

How To Avoid It

Engage team members – product owners and product managers, designers, developers, etc. – in product strategy and conceptualization. Agile approach is based on a unified approach, implying several members of your project team collaborate tin the entire product development process, including product definition.

4. Confusing innovation with value

If you rush to include innovation and development expenses can go up. New technologies and abilities can at times trigger panic and turn the execution of new features haywire. This kind of problem can be arrested with proper mobile app planning; a PRD permits lesser errors between development handoffs and highlights the requirements to ascertain the essentiality of feature alteration.

The way to bypass the same

Be focused on your product objectives and keep in mind that you are devising a product for a certain target user. Will this feature or functionality offer anything new or value to the end-user? Is this necessary for the product? If the answer for these is no, then you do away with the feature or implement the same in future not now.

5. Ignoring Competitive Threats

Market viability is imperative for any product, and competitive threats can spoil your development plans. Apart from keeping track of the customer, you must be observant of emerging trends and technologies. At times, your competitors will launch products with features very alike to yours. In such a situation, your team might have to pivot. Yet again, a PRD can be very helpful in these situations as you might have already discussed and documented several solutions to certain features that suits the scope and budget of your project.

The way to bypass the same

Industry and competitor research should be an essential part of your product strategy.

What is your competition providing?

How is your product distinct?

The needs and problems your product solve that other products don’t?

These questions can be ignored at your peril. It’s essential to know your rival’s strengths and weaknesses to make your product unique. With good research, you can highlight your product’s USP.

6. Unable to choose between needs and privileges

You can’t implement all features in the first version of your product. It’s a must to understand the main feature suitable to resolve your users’ central issues. Devoid of proper communication, it’s tough to ascertain the features that are essential and the ones that are good but not a must at this juncture.

How to tackle the same

Put in place a classification system to prioritize features. Sit with your project team to ascertain the features that are important to have versus the features your product can ignore to start with.

Finally

A well-thought out product planning offers your app a good chance in the market. By bypassing the product strategy errors mentioned above, you can offer your team an opportunity to succeed in the market. A mobile app requirements document is a handy tool to get a clarity of requirements and how your product can achieve the same.