In response to the growing demand for user-friendly applications, the role of an Android app development company has become paramount. These companies are dedicated to creating streamlined and intuitive mobile apps, catering to the preferences of the 6.92 billion active mobile users worldwide in April 2023. Their expertise in simplifying the user experience ensures that users gravitate towards their products in an increasingly competitive app market.

Effective UX services are essential for crafting an intuitive navigation menu in a mobile application. These services focus on optimizing user journeys, ensuring smooth interactions, and designing visually appealing menus that elevate the overall user experience. A well-crafted navigation menu, as a result of proficient UX services, plays a pivotal role in defining the success and quality of any mobile application.

Custom software developers play a pivotal role in enhancing mobile app navigation systems. Their expertise ensures that users can seamlessly interact with apps, bridging the gap between user expectations and software functionality. Explore our blog to discover how these developers incorporate innovative features to create intuitive and user-friendly navigation experiences.

Types of Mobile Navigation Patterns

Navigation through a mobile application must be predictable and intuitive. There is a vast range of design patterns available that designers can easily implement to make a complete navigation system in the mobile app. The top 8 mobile navigation patterns include:

1. The Hamburger Menu

The Hamburger menu, also called the navigation menu, is a very common icon with a hamburger-like shape with 3 horizontal lines. The menu section is hidden in this icon and once you click the icon, you can navigate all the menus. 

As the best mobile navigator, it is widely popular among UI/UX designing professionals as it can cover the navigation between 3 lines and it helps users navigate menus more conveniently. The Hamburger Menu is small in size and it saves screen space by hiding all navigational elements.

Key benefits of this menu include: 

• Simplifies screen layouts
• Offers direct access to navigation
• Ideal for secondary access
• Very easy to recognize

2. Floating Navigation Button

A floating navigation button or FAB is a circular-shaped icon that doesn’t float on the user interfaces. It mainly hovers over content for promoting the primary action in the mobile application. Just like Hamburger Menu, FAB is small in size and takes very less space on the mobile screen. However, sometimes it can distract the users. In such cases, page content may fail to notice. So, it’s not mandatory to add a FAB button on all pages. When you add this icon, you should ensure that it’s leaving a good impact on your user’s mind.

Key benefits of the FAB menu include

• Small in size
• Takes very little space
• Enhances user experience
• Easy to recognize

3. Gesture-based Navigation

Gesture-based navigation enables an immersive and excellent experience for mobile applications by allowing app users to swipe in all directions. This is a very popular navigation pattern and gained high popularity among Gen Z people. The smooth interface of gesture-based navigation makes it different from others. Moreover, this is feasible for users and it comes with a pretty UI design pattern.

Key benefits of this navigation include:

• Faster, natural & ergonomic navigation pattern
• Easy to use
• Unique UI design pattern
• Improves user experience

4. Sub-Navigation Menu

This is a unique type of navigation pattern that provides multiple hierarchy levels in the application. One of the best examples of a sub-nav app is Amazon. If you’re planning to build an app similar to Amazon, the sub-navigation menu can be the perfect choice for you. 

It helps to add category and subcategory sections and enables users to navigate between pages with ease. Sub-nav menu mainly appears as a list and in a dropdown format. This navigation pattern helps to keep app content organized & makes it simpler for app users to find what they’re in search of.

Key benefits of the sub-navigation menu include.

• Simple to use
• Organizes the app content
• Helps to navigate between pages easily
• Easy to recognize

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5. Full-Screen Navigation

Till now we were only focusing on such navigation patterns that covered little screen space, but the full-screen navigation pattern comes with a unique concept. As the name suggests, it covers the entire screen space for navigation. Key elements of full-screen navigation patterns include 

• Simplicity: Navigation should not be complicated. Every page must come with a simple navigation structure that ensures a smooth user experience.
• Clarity: The full-screen navigation menu structure should be clear without any requirement for additional explanations.
• Consistency: Users must know where they’re & how to quickly navigate back to the app pages they have browsed previously.
• User orientation: A well-designed navigation menu should have the same design for all app pages without exceptions.

Key benefits of a full-screen mobile navigation menu include:

• Improves user experience
• Best for achieving coherence and simplicity
• Excellent user orientation
• Consistency and clarity

6. Tab Navigation

Tab navigation usually appears at the bottom of iOS apps & the top of Android apps. This is a

UI style and navigation where information is properly organized in tabs that separate content into several sections. 

The tab navigation pattern is mainly used to help users switch between pages with similar contexts. This pattern can be a great choice if you have several categories of content.

Key benefits of Tab Navigation include: 

• The categories properly fit in one row
• Easy to recognize
• Enhances user experience

7. Sidebar Navigation

Sidebar navigation is one of the best choices for designers who would like to place different categories. This navigation pattern helps to grab the user’s attention and allows them to explore specific categories. The sidebar navigation pattern works perfectly when the information architecture has many items that can’t be grouped into different buckets logically.

Key Benefits of This Navigator for Mobile Include: 

• Allows to include different menu items
• All elements are noticeable
• Supports customizable navigation
• Easy to use
• Utilizes little screen space

8. Top and Bottom Navigation

The top and bottom navigation bars are the two sides of a coin. A top navigation pattern contains a bar with icons and it’s located at the top of the mobile screen. The top nav bar usually shows the important links to the users. A mobile app development company also suggests integrating this navigation as it’s pretty simple & easier to use.

Bottom navigation is another side of the coin. This is a navigation pattern that simply collects primary & secondary navigation links. So that users can smoothly explore the menus with just a single tap. Another major advantage of this pattern is that users comfortably navigate with their fingers, mostly thumbs while holding their smartphone. Most bottom navigation patterns have between 3 to 5 destinations for fast access.

Key benefits of the top and bottom navigation bar include: 

• Makes it simple for users to click icons
• Utilizes little screen space
• Improves user experience
• Direct access to particular links
• Allows to navigate with ease

Best Mobile Navigation Examples

A well-organized navigation system is one of the major keys to excellent user experience on a limited screen. Good navigation always helps users smoothly navigate through the mobile app. Here are the top 5 examples of widely popular apps that use different types of navigation design systems for improved user experience.

1. Facebook:

Facebook is a social media giant used for many things. The smooth interface and seamless navigation system of this social media platform give an unparalleled user experience to every user. Facebook is the best example where you can see the combination of different navigation patterns – a hamburger menu, and a top and bottom nav bar. With these navigation patterns, Facebook can manage both primary and secondary things easily.

2. Twitter:

Twitter is another great example where you can see more than one navigation pattern. It contains a top navigation bar, floating nav button, and bottom navigation that offers a seamless user experience. As a social media platform, this app deeply focuses on the bottom navigation bar that shows five major aspects of the whole application. 

App Name

Types of Navigation Bars

Facebook

A Hamburger Menu

Top Navigation Bar

Bottom Navigation Bar

Twitter

Top Navigation Bar

Bottom Navigation Bar

Floating Nav Button

Tinder

Gesture Based Navigation

Top Navigation Bar

Telegram

A Hamburger Menu

Instagram

Bottom Navigation Bar

3. Tinder:

Tider is one of the popular dating apps which is widely popular among Gen Z people because of its gesture-based navigation system and top-notch user interface. The smooth left & right navigation patterns help to keep things very dynamic, easier & extremely entertaining. Moreover, this app also has a top navigation bar that links important pages to improve user experience. 

4. Telegram:

Telegram is an instant messaging app that contains a hamburger menu. The easy UI design and smooth navigation make the app easier to use and navigate. The well-organized hamburger menu of the Telegram app offers the important navigation options a user needs such as new groups, contacts, calls, settings, invite friends, and more. 

5. Instagram:

Instagram is a widely popular social site that allows you to click & share reels, stories, photos, and videos with your friends & followers. This platform mainly focuses on the bottom navigation system that allows you to quickly navigate 5 major elements such as home, search, create a post, reels, and user account.

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Final Word

The mobile app navigation system plays a big role in boosting the app’s usability, practicality, and user experience. The limited screen space along with the high expectations of users regarding app usability make a mobile navigation design intuitive & seamless. Technically, mobile app navigation is a vast concept and it requires a lot of creativity. Have any projects in your mind for mobile app development? Stay in touch with Sphinx Solutions.

According to a report by Statista, “The global revenue from mobile apps increased to over USD 318 billion in 2020, which was an increase of about USD 60 billion compared to 2019.”

This confers that the mobile app industry is growing at a fast rate. However, when it comes to mobile apps, the two most popular platforms are Android and iOS.

As per the reports, the Apple App Store has seen 130 billion iOS app downloads since its launch in 2008.

iPhone and iPad users tend to invest more in technology and purchase apps compared to Android users. In this blog, we will give you in-depth information about iOS app development, including the cost to develop an iPhone app, and related factors to consider.

What is iOS App development?

iOS is the operating system of Apple, and it runs on devices such as iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch. 

An iOS application is programmed in different languages like Swift and Objective-C. The developed apps are deployed to the app store for the users to download.

Types of iOS App Development 

In this section, we will tell you the different types of iOS app development. iOS development can be done for both native and hybrid apps. 

Native iOS apps 

This type of app is specifically developed for the iOS platform using app development languages and tools like Swift, Objective-C, and Xcode. 

Native iOS apps don’t run on the browser and can only be downloaded from Apple’s app store.

Hybrid apps 

This type of app can be used on both the platforms Android and iOS. The code of hybrid apps is written in languages such as HTML, JavaScript, and CSS.

Once the code is written, the code is encapsulated within a native app. Hybrid apps are a combination of native and web apps.

How to make app?

To build an iOS app, you first need to select the right iOS and iPhone app development language. 

Below, we have listed some of the best programming languages for both native and iOS app development.

Swift 

Swift is a popular and commonly used programming language for iOS app development. It is widely used for developing native iOS apps due to its easy-to-use syntax.

It works with different frameworks, such as Cocoa, Cocoa Touch, and the extensive codebase written in Objective-C for Apple devices.

You can use Swift language to develop an iOS app quickly and expand it later. 

Flutter 

Flutter is an open-source app development platform that can be used to create cross-platform apps for iOS, Android, Mac, Linux, Windows, and Google Fuchsia. 

It is a very commonly used cross-platform app development language. You can use flutter to create Android, desktop, and web app versions of your iOS app. 

Objective-C 

Objective-C is one of the oldest programming languages developed in the early 1980s. It is an advancement of the C programming language.

This language is generally used for programming Apple’s operating systems, such as OS X, iOS, and their APIs-Cocoa & Cocoa touch. 

If you are looking to create an app that is compatible with the older versions of iOS, then Objective-C is a good choice. 

This programming language can help you develop an iOS app quickly with less time and resources.

How do you make an app?

The iOS app development process is similar to that of any other app development process. Here, we will discuss the essential steps involved in the development of iOS and iPhone apps.

Market Research 

In today’s competitive business world, it is very important to deliver the best experience to your customers.

Before starting with your iOS app development, you must conduct thorough market research. 

This will aid you in understanding what your competitors are delivering and how you can offer better to your users. 

Adherence to Apple’s Guidelines 

Apple has its own guidelines to which you must adhere to develop your iOS app. You must ensure that you follow all the regulations related to the design, privacy, and security of users.

Apple only deploys those apps on its store that comply with all its regulations and security standards. 

Designing Process

There are various steps involved in the designing process of iOS app development, which we have given below:

• Wireframing : Wireframe refers to the basic outlook of the app. Once the ideation of the app is done, the next step involves documenting the requirements from the design perspective. This digital sketch helps the team understand what is needed to develop the app and what it would look like. 
• UI/UX design: This step involves not only focusing on the design but the user interface of the app. You must make sure that your app is both visually appealing and user-friendly.  
• Software Architecture: This includes three important elements of the model view controller (MVC) paradigm that are data, user, and software. It is the step that ensures the app’s scalability and stability. 

Development process

Development is the most important phase of iOS app development. This step involves bringing the app idea into reality. It involves three vital aspects that are: 

• Backend development: It focuses on databases, back-end logic, architecture, and servers. It ensures that the apps function perfectly.
• Frontend development: Itrefers to the coding and creation of features of an app that the users can see. It focuses on the visual details of the app.
• Application Programming Interfaces: APIs enable apps to access another party’s application or platform. 

Testing 

Once the iOS development is done, the next step is to execute QA testing. The iOS developer must test the app to ensure its functionality and stability.

The QA testing team tests the app to ensure optimized performance, high security (SSL pinning), and thorough compliance. 

Deployment

This is the last step in the iPhone app development process. It involves submitting the application to the Apple app store.

Apple will deploy your app once they have checked it completely and it has passed the security standards. It may take a few days to weeks to approve and deploy the application.

Factors to consider before choosing an iOS app development company

To build the best iOS application, it is important to engage the right iOS app agency. 

Nowadays, so many iOS app development companies are available in the market that selecting an appropriate one seems difficult. 

Below, we have given some of the factors that you must consider before hiring an iOS app development company. 

Technical Background 

First, you must make sure that the iOS developers of the company are proficient

in developing iOS apps. 

The developers should have strong technical knowledge of the latest iOS app development tools and programming languages such as Swift, XCode, and Objective-C.  

Their team should be able to understand your idea & requirements and develop an iOS app accordingly. 

Ratings & Reviews 

Before contacting an iOS app development company, you must check out different client review platforms. 

Checking the ratings and client reviews of the company in the marketplace will give you an idea of the company’s reputation and work performance. 

You can also find detailed information like the company size in terms of employees, no of apps developed, and case studies. 

Dedicated Resources 

Make sure that the company provides you with a dedicated team for your iOS app development project. 

The team should be adept at building an app as per your business requirements. You must check out their similar projects to see if they can deliver solutions according to your needs.

Agile development process 

An agile development process is a customer-centric approach that allows you to see the product at every development stage and recommend changes. 

This methodology ensures customer satisfaction, as the client is involved in every step. You must try to opt for a company that follows an agile development process. 

How to Start an app? 

iOS App Development Cost

The iOS app development cost depends on various factors, such as the size of the app, complexity, UI/UX, native or cross-platform, etc. 

Sphinx Solutions is a trusted and leading iOS app development company with expertise in building highly secure and scalable apps. 

With more than 12 years of experience, we have helped many businesses to accomplish their objectives with our best-in-class iOS and Android apps.

Schedule a call with our experts to know more information about iOS app development services, or email us at sales@sphinx-solution.com.

You might have heard people telling you how they’re building the next big app. For some reason, the ‘app’ is talked of as a proxy to success. 

Is that true?

To capitalize on this growing trend, partnering with a reputable Android app development company is essential. Choosing the right Android app development company can significantly impact the success of your venture, ensuring your application is not only user-friendly but also well-crafted to meet the evolving demands of the market. 

When considering the development of mobile applications, collaborating with Indian app developers is a strategic choice, given their reputation for expertise and cost-effectiveness. Understanding the dynamics of Indian app developers cost is pivotal in planning a budget that ensures quality without compromising financial sustainability.

In the rapidly evolving landscape of mobile applications, the challenge lies not only in creating engaging apps but also in navigating the intricate monetization strategies. With a meager 5% of users willing to pay for applications, the question arises: how do free apps generate revenue? To unravel this, let's delve into the fundamentals.

How to Create a Successful Application?

If you're contemplating entering the app market, a critical consideration is, "How much does it cost to make an app?" Despite the prevalence of free apps dominating the global application economy, the industry's worth in billions underscores the potential for lucrative returns, making it essential to assess the expenses associated with app development before delving into this dynamic market.

Here’s the fact that you must keep in mind before reading ahead. Free apps hold the maximum of the world application economy as opposed to paid apps. Note here that the app market is worth billions worldwide. Revenue from free apps is expected to increase shortly. 

So, how to create a successful application. Here are the steps that you’ll need to follow:

• Study your competition well. Don’t barge into the development process before you know what you are competing against. 

• Begin with an idea. Be aware of the problem you are targeting. Identify the service/product that your app can offer to solve this problem. And finally, make a list of the features you’ll have in your app.

• The next step is to choose the platform: iOS or Android. Compare them and analyze them. 

• Check the app development languages, tools, and SDKs. Some examples of this are Objective-C, Swift (both for iOS), Kotlin, Java (both for Android), etc. 

• Select the types of app you will be launching: Native app, Flutter, or Hybrid app.

• Estimate The Cost Of Development based on the complexity of the application. If it’s a messaging application, the cost would largely depend upon design complexity, software development stages, etc. 

• No matter how tight your budget is, you have to invest a big chunk of it in the graphic design of your app. The graphics attract users like anything.

• Find the right software outsourcing company. It’s often observed that outsourcing is more budget-friendly than hiring a full-fledged tech partner.

• The last step is to calculate the development cost, using a “cost calculator tool” or you can calculate it yourself by using this formula:

App Development Time x Hourly Price = Total App Development Cost

Tip: Once you know the estimated cost, try reducing it by studying different payment models for app development and each step included in them. 

How to Make Money with Android Apps or iOS Apps?

Professional App Developers would always recommend you to go for a suitable monetization model that can work for your audience. For either Android or iOS, you’ll need to keep yourself updated with the following ways of monetizing your app:

• Paid Apps
• In-App Purchases
• Freemium model
• Subscription model
• In-App Advertisement
• Partnership monetization or Sponsorship

Paid Apps

Let’s first study the difference between Paid and Free Apps:

• Free apps require nominal app development costs, while paid apps require high app development costs. 
• There are always fewer downloads of paid apps, while free apps often attract more user attention and frequent downloads. 
• User expectation is relatively high when they pay for a paid app. So, it would be best if you had flawless mobile app development. With a free app, users usually expect a decent interface. With some good reviews, you can survive with your free app. 
• With free apps, you have plenty of monetization possibilities in the future. Contrarily, with paid apps, you have limited prospects of monetization, and you have to pay a monthly/annual fee for it. 

In-App Purchases

Simply put, this is the first and smartest answer to your question, “how to earn money from Developing Android Apps that are free?” 

Your application is great; it has impressive features, perfect graphics, and an excellent interface. Now check how this app makes money. 

You can add additional features, extra redeemable points, or in-app currencies. There are two main types of in-app purchases:

• Consumable: These are the products that, when purchased, the user can consume within the application. Some examples of consumable items are virtual money, redeemable points, health points, virtual currencies, etc. 
• Non-consumable: These are those products that, once purchased, are permanent. Some examples of non-consumable items are maps, games, etc. That’s also how free apps make money without ads. 

Subscriptions

It’s also one of the types of in-app purchases. 

It’s meant for applications that have high user engagement. In fact, a subscription is a considerably better type of in-app purchase. Some examples of apps monetized via subscription plans include Netflix and Spotify. 

Freemium Model

In this model, the users get basic features in the free application. To get some extra functions, the users have to pay extra. Even if only 5% of your audience buys the premium version, it would still reach a wider audience. 

The Freemium Model (Free + Premium) works best with cloud services, educational applications, photo-editing apps, etc. 

It also works well with games, which offer only a few features to the players and for the full experience, they have to pay a bit extra. 

In-App Advertising

That’s by far the best way how the app makes money. Three types of in-app ads that you can get for your application are:

CPV (Cost per view) model is based on how many times your app users watch the video ads. 

CPC (Cost per click) model is based on the number of clicks the ads get on your app. 

CPI  (Cost per install) model is based on the number of installations. 

However, before getting any of these models, you must keep a check on the type of ads that will be displayed on your app. Do keep in mind, the ads should load swiftly, and be relevant to your audience. Users tend to lose patience with clunky and irrelevant ads, and this deteriorates the user experience.

Now, the question arises: how much money do apps make per ad? 

That depends on the type of ad unit and the application. You can have four different types of ad formats: Interstitial ads, Banner ads, Video ads, and Native ads.

No matter what type of ad is put up there, a difference is always there between the amount you get on an Android app and the amount you get on an Apple app. Apple, of course, pays better. Like, in the U.S., the revenue per download on an Android app is $.01875 while on an Apple app, it is $.1, and on Microsoft, it’s $.1538. 

Partnership Monetization or Sponsorship

Sponsorship is another effective way to earn money through your app. It’s also known as influencer marketing or partnership monetization. It is quite prevalent on social media platforms like Instagram these days. 

So, if you have already established your brand/videos/app in the market, you can become an influencer for another brand. That way, brands will contact you to use your mobile app for their brands’ marketing. And the best part of this type of monetization technique is that it will be a win-win for both of you.