In the world of mobile development, themes and templates have been around for a while. CodeCanyon and Themeforest have the most extensive library of prefabs, but there are other vendors as well. A few years ago, the template business was focused on websites and WordPress templates, but things are changing very quickly.

In 2018, the largest mobile app ecosystem turned ten years old. Google and the App Store have seen a huge growth in apps in recent years. The total number of applications available for download in these stores has already exceeded 7 million.

Startups based on mobile products are growing rapidly, developers need to create projects quickly and with minimal financial costs. For this, the modular way of creating applications is the best suited, and templates become a real salvation.

What are app templates?

The collective experience of several large mobile product development agencies proves that much of the process is iterative. Even applications that are not clones of their predecessors use similar components to work.

In such a situation, it would be logical and natural to use ready-made templates in the development process. Mobile app templates are the foundation that will help you create your product. The primary source code (sometimes referred to as the application starter) is implemented inside the template. By using a template, you gain an advantage in the development process and can release a product in a shorter time than if you developed it from scratch.

Should you use templates?

Imagine that you are going to create an application and get a ready-made user interface for it. You can connect your logic, your product and backend, add personality and prepare the application for placement in stores. The finished product will turn out the way you intended it, but at the same time, in the development process, you will save not only time, but also money.

There are several advantages to using templates in application development:

- Cheaper. A ready-made user interface will save you thousands of dollars. UI development is an important step that many startups spend most of their budget and time on. But what's the point of designing from scratch when you can take a ready-made template and customize it to your needs? Moreover, it is also beneficial.
- Faster. You save weeks (in some cases months) of time that could have been spent developing the user interface of the product. Reduced development time allows you to enter the mobile app market earlier and start gaining an audience faster.
- Reducing the cost of the development team. This is especially true for start-ups where the co-founders are not developers. Hiring a separate UI development team is an additional expense. The use of templates significantly reduces costs.
- Familiar user interface and no bugs. Using a good application template guarantees a good user experience (people will see the interface they are used to).

It often happens that developers create a product based on their knowledge and skills, resulting in working, but poorly written code. The finished template is written taking into account all the necessary standards and, as a rule, does not contain errors in the code.

Why will the popularity of templates grow?

Templates are increasingly being used in mobile application development, as it is convenient and allows you to solve several problems with minimal time and money.

Everyone needs apps . Today, even schoolchildren and students sometimes need to create an application for passing a test or an exam. Naturally, this must be done quickly, and here templates come to the rescue. The template itself can't be considered homework, but tweaking the base is much easier than building everything from scratch.

Advertising applications . Landing pages are often made to promote products, courses, and stories about upcoming events. With the advent of templates, mobile applications began to be used for this. You can easily create an application that tells about an event at a university or a city day celebration. Such products are intended for temporary use and it would be overkill to hire a development team to create a user interface from scratch.


The rise of traditional business applications . The traditional business is gradually moving into the world of mobile products, but this is happening quite slowly. Using templates will help to quickly expand the boundaries of business distribution, attract new customers. As a rule, such applications do not require complex functions, there is no need for geolocation, push notifications, calendar access, etc. Therefore, using templates will be a great solution.

Things to remember

In most cases, application templates are effective and great help, but there are a few points to consider before making the final decision on the use in the development of ready-made solutions.

Infinite settings are possible . When creating an application, many people want it to be a little different from others, to have some features. If you want a 100% unique app, it's best to avoid templates. However, if the template meets most of your requirements, and you can get by with a few modifications, feel free to use ready-made solutions.

Problems with the server side . Application templates cannot provide ready-made internals that are integrated into an application. You may end up with endless reshuffles, long setup times, core technology differences, increased resource usage.

Pre-release setup . The use of templates does not guarantee that you will receive an application that can be added to stores without modifications. If you don't have the necessary knowledge on how to prepare an app for uploading to the App Store and Google Play, this can be a little tricky.

Are templates the only option for rapid development?

If for some reason you don't want to use templates, there are a few more options to help you build your app faster. For example, Apple and Google have app development packages (Xcode and Android Studio, respectively) that provide a set of prebuilt user interfaces. Ionic also has its own application builder, with which you can easily and quickly create a user interface for various products. There are other options for online designers that allow you to create an application using the drag-and-drop method (a method of operating interface elements using a mouse or touch screen).

Of course, templates and online builders are still very limited in many ways, but this is a good start that can make the development process easier and faster.