App development is a long process consisting of many stages. A team would need to finish one stage before moving on to the next. Large corporations often hire large teams to take care of their major projects. Small businesses do not have this kind of financial muscle so they might only hire a single freelance developer. They could also try to make their own using online drag and drop app maker tools. Whichever path they choose, they will still need to follow the app development life cycle:
Discovery
This initial stage is the part where they will perform market research. They must learn more about their target users and what they want in an app. They should check out the competition and attempt to create something better. After synthesizing their findings, the team will come up with the technical specifications of their proposed app. They will map out all of the features and present these to the client for approval.
Design
Once the concept has been approved, they can move on to the design of the app including sketches of how the pages should look like. They can fine-tune the design language, the placement of each element, and other aspects to ensure functionality. They will also create wireframes which are black and white models that provide the overall structure without the colors and content. Finally, they will make a prototype which is a basic front end model with clickable buttons but lacking key features.
Development
This is where the actual coding happens in traditional development. With drag and drop tools, design and development are merged thanks to the visual interface. The codes are automatically added based in what can be seen on the front end.
Testing
Every piece of software has bugs. Newly developed apps have lots of them. They require extensive testing to find out where these are and fix the problems they make. Extensive testing is necessary to provide a polished app experience for the end-users.
Release
Now it’s time to publish in the app store. Make sure that the app adheres to the rules to prevent rejection. Developers will ensure a smooth process. Drag and drop sites may also provide assistance to their customers.
Maintenance
You might notice that many apps keep getting new updates. Developers maintain them long-term to fix newly discovered bugs and provide new features. They could also release new versions if necessary for better compatibility with current hardware and software.