Native apps are designed to run directly on a device's operating system. They must be downloaded from app stores and updated through new downloads. Web apps run in browsers using HTML5 but can automatically update without downloads. Hybrid apps combine aspects of both - they are downloaded like native apps but can use web technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript and update content over the air. They can also access device features like cameras through JavaScript.

1. Native, web and
hybrid apps
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2. What’s the difference?
Definitions that a humble, not-too-technical, marketer can understand
 Native App
 An application designed to run in the environment being used (iPhone,
Android, Blackberry etc).
 To use a native app, the customer has to ‘download’ software onto their
phone, and the programme runs from the phone, accessing some
remote data if needed. Because it’s installed on the phone, such apps can
access (and use) phone functions like cameras, contact lists etc.
 Improvements to the app require the user to re-visit their app store and
download a new version of the app (“updates”)
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3. What’s the difference?
Definitions that a humble, not-too-technical, marketer can understand
 Web App
 An “application” that uses software already on the device (phone) with which to
access the specific programme.
 Typically this is the web browser, using HTML5.
 The application ‘hides’ this by amending what the browser looks like on screen,
instead providing a frame which looks and feels like the programme the
customer is expecting to use. (e.g you won’t be able to ‘see’ or access the URL
bar etc).
 Any improvements to the app to be updated automatically ‘over the air’
whenever it is accessed by the customer, and without their express knowledge
(or consent).
 A primary reason that many companies are not already jumping on the HTML5
bandwagon is because HTML ‘apps’ cannot access native device features: they
are currently restricted in their access to features such as the camera,
microphone, address book, and so forth
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4. What’s the difference?
Definitions that a humble, not-too-technical, marketer can understand
 Hybrid App
 A hybrid app is a native, downloadable app, that runs all or some of its user
interface in an embedded browser component.
 To the user, a hybrid app is almost indistinguishable from a native one: it is
downloaded from the app store or marketplace, it is stored on the device, and it
is launched just like any other app.
 To developers there is a huge difference, because instead of rewriting the app
from scratch for each mobile OS, they write at least some of their application
code in HTML, CSS and JavaScript, and reuse it across devices.
 Hybrid apps can use JavaScript code to query the compass, take pictures, find or
create contacts and appointments, and tap many other device features that
mobile web apps are barred from accessing.
 Hybrid apps are also mostly distributed through app stores: you don’t browse to
a hybrid app – you download and install it.
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5. Table of comparison examples
Native App Web App Hybrid App
%age native code 100% varies 0%
Offline content   
Access GPS   
Control Camera   Coming soon
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6. A financial services Hybrid example
Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC)
NB. This is purely to show a financial services example using the technology – *not* to showcase the best of what is possible
with a hybrid design
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7. Hybrid App
Logitech Squeezebox Controller – functionality and design within a hybrid wrapper
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8. Cheers!
Marketing!
Incentivated
23 Curtain Road
London EC2A 3LT
Tel: 0845 130 3985
(No code reader? Text CODE to 62233 for
a link to a reader appropriate for your
phone)
Copyright Incentivated Limited 2011 www.incentivated.com