Website or app: which does my business need?

Most businesses should start with a website. An app is worth building when people will use it every day, when it has to keep working without a connection, or when it needs things only a phone offers, like the camera or notifications. Often the honest answer is a website now, an app later, or only a website.

When a website is enough

A website works for almost everyone who has a phone or a computer, with nothing to install. People find it by searching, you can share it with a link, and when you change it, everyone sees the change at once.

A website is usually the right place to start if you want to:

• Tell people what you do and let them contact you.
• Sell products or take bookings.
• Give customers a login to see their orders or their account.
• Be found by people who search for what you offer.

Notice the last one. People find a website by searching the web. An app is found mostly in an app store, and only by people who already know to look for it.

When an app is worth building

An app earns its place when it does something a website does badly. Here is what I look for:

• People will open it often. A delivery tracker, a habit tracker, a tool a team uses all day.
• It has to work with a poor connection or none. Think of a field worker filling in forms where there is no signal, which then send themselves when the phone is back online.
• It needs the phone itself. Taking pictures, scanning codes, location, or notifications that arrive even when the app is closed.

If none of those is true for you, an app is probably more than you need, and a website already solves the problem.

Android and iPhone are two different worlds

If you do decide on an app, remember that Android phones and iPhones are separate platforms. You either build for both, or you choose one first and see how it goes. I build native apps for each: Kotlin for Android, Swift for iPhone. Which one to start with depends on who your customers are and what phones they carry.

A website can behave a lot like an app

A modern website can be saved to a phone's home screen, can work offline in simple ways, and can feel quick and smooth. For many ideas, that closes most of the gap, which is another reason to begin with a website and watch how people use it.

How to decide

Ask yourself these four questions:

1. Do I need people to find me through a search?
2. Will my customers use this every day, or now and then?
3. Does it need to work without internet?
4. Does it need the camera, notifications or location?

If your answers are "yes, now and then, no, no", you want a website. If they are "not really, every day, yes, yes", you want an app. A mixed set of answers usually means a website first, then an app once you know what people actually do.

Questions people ask

Related work

If you are not sure which one fits, that is exactly what the free consultation is for. You can also read about building a website for your business or a custom business app. Once you have decided, what to prepare before you hire a developer is the next step.