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Comment by a3w | Hacker News Reader

> but I think for most developers wanting to build an app it's more common to build for iOS first, and then port to Android later if the app gets traction.

Is it? There seem to be a hundred million Java developers out there, that can do an Android app, plus even release that in-house or with minimal registration fees if single dev/sideproject.

For Objective-C/Swift, there seem to be ten percent as many devs.

I always only tinkered with Android apps in my spare time, but never managed to deploy anything to iOS.

Also, outside the US, iPhones are a 10 % niche product in private hands, but companies might use a lot of iPads or provide iPhones as work phones, so perhaps companies do think of both platforms as second class citizens (behind windows/browser as two other "OS-like" primary platforms)

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It probably varies from area to area, but in the US iOS first is common.

Having developed both, it makes sense.

iOS is by far the more profitable of the two platforms and its support burden is substantially lower — far fewer versions to think about with the bulk of users running 0-2 versions behind, single form factor (only size variants), zero manufacturer skin quirks/bugs to deal with. It’s a more fertile environment for getting up and running and getting the core product shaken out.

Android can come later when you’re out of rapid iteration and have the bandwidth to deal with the idiosyncrasies of the Android world.

In large parts of the world, the iOS and Android revenue share are roughly 50/50 with the higher $/user of iOS and the higher market share of Android cancelling each other out. And that means everyone makes hybrid apps unless they're in a niche where that's impossible, which is rare. Only if they become very successful or raise massive funding (for that country), then they might switch to two native apps.

It's probably a US centric take you're replying to.

Having worked at multiple companies making apps in the US and the company I work at right now which is a company almost everyone knows the name of and the vast majority of our revenue comes from our native apps - practically every feature we build is iOS and web first and only if it performs well do we even consider adding to android most of the time. And it's primarily because product/execs know iOS users are more likely to pay for things.

It's sad as an android user myself, but android is very much a second class citizen in the US

It's not really about the number of developers. If you're running a company in the US at least, most of your revenue is going to come from iOS users.

The US still has a strong iOS market share, shipments just never go below 50%

https://counterpointresearch.com/en/insights/us-smartphone-m...

Even ignoring global OS marketshare, iOS app store customers just simply spend a lot more money per user on the App Store vs Google Play (Google's Android app store). You gotta go where the money is to some extent to get paid.

Global revenues on the iOS app store have always been significantly larger than Google play, even with only ~30% of the global smartphone market.

> https://sqmagazine.co.uk/iphone-vs-android-statistics/

Average amount of money spent means little in the context of parent's comment (revenue for a US company).

For instance, if you're Netflix, do iOS user bring you more revenue in the US ? What if you're Hertz ? What about Walmart or Costco ? The only factor will be how many of your users are on iOS vs android. It's a different story if you're a gaming company and target whales of course.

Even if you're a social media company, where network effect is everything and getting into everyone's pocket matters, you can still go iOS first. Snap ran with that strategy at first, and it hardly killed the company.

Notably, that's a situation that actually matters for cross-compatibility. There's no web client for SnapChat. Hertz & Costco could point Android users to the web with few repurcussions, IMO

This is still about the actual market share. iOS being 55%+ of the market makes that strategy viable in the US. You'd start with android instead if you were to launch in Korea for instance.

for us its pixel phones, you can choose iphone if you want but most of us want pixel. so for me its macbook + pixel. I think the iphone only is unique to US.

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