I don't think it's impossible to have (relatively) lightweight hybrid apps. The article focuses entirely on electron, which ships a whole browser. There are other options, such as pywebview, that use the system native browser. Still means the underlying JS bundle has to perform, which goes the same for websites too.

That said, I normally seek native apps where possible (ripcord for slack, sublime), but that's also pretty hipocrytical of me ref Kanmail!