Top 10 Mobile App Development Trends for 2020 and Beyond

According to Statista, mobile apps are expected to generate $189 Billion US dollars in revenue by 2020.

What do you infer from the above statistics? Yes, mobile apps are growing exponentially as the number of users leveraging the apps has increased significantly over the years. 

The rise in smartphone technology has paved the way for an increase in applications used by customers worldwide and we could see the trend growing strongly in 2019. It is all set to continue in 2020.

With that being said, keeping a tab on and leveraging the latest app development trends and updates in the business landscape is super important for success and delivering world-class customer experience. 

Here in this post, I have compiled top 10 mobile app development trends that will not only create an impact on the businesses in 2020, even beyond that. 

1. Machine learning & AI

The era of serving customers with generic data is waning. Modern-day customers want personalized data and context-based results. This is where AI and ML come in handy. Leveraging these technologies, any app development company can produce apps that understand the user's intent to provide specific results based on their unique needs. 

ML and AI power app developers with learning, reasoning and problem-solving abilities to create intuitive applications that glue with customers by adding value. 

So, the part played by ML and AI in the future of mobile app development can’t be overlooked. 

2. Internet of Things

The Internet of Things, shortly known as IoT, is growing fast and its use cases across different verticals are growing at jaw-dropping rate. One thing is for sure. IoT is not just for home automations anymore. Industries like Manufacturing, Logistics, and Construction etc. have already started to leverage the power of IoT devices and are seeing outstanding results. 

The power of IoT-enabled mobile apps even doubles the efficiency of most businesses. For example, the manufacturing industry uses IoT technology and mobile apps to analyze the machine efficiency data in real-time and they are glad to see their productivity rate shooting up by at least 10x. 

The growth of IoT app development will continue for at least some years as there are still potential areas that can be leveraged. 

3. Cloud applications

Gartner predicts that the public cloud services market will grow 17% next year, from US$ 227.8 billion in 2019 to an estimated US$ 266.4 by the end of 2020.

Cloud, like many presume, is no longer an expensive option for businesses as the year of 2020 the use cases of the emerging technology is expected to explode further.

With the Cloud, businesses are now able to solve even security-related challenges and it is possible to develop user-friendly applications that can directly run on Cloud. 

4. Beacon technology

Beacon technology is widely used in mobile app development nowadays. As most mobile apps are powered by GPS facilities, locating precise and micro-areas is always daunting. With beacon technology monitoring even the micro-location is simple and seamless.

The technology has a wide range of use cases in construction and manufacturing verticals for tracking assets. The technology is widely used in Marketing for collecting location-based information of customers. 

5. Wearable devices

The reason why wearable apps are widely used by consumers is their connectivity to data at any time and anywhere. Thanks to the compact size and shape. The growth of wearable devices is increasing massively over the past few years and this would reach a new maximum in the years to come.

There are quite a lot of wearable apps available in the market that would help the customers looking for access to data on-the-go. 

6. 5G Technology

With 4G technology not supporting the growing needs of customers’ data consumption, the evolution of 5G is inevitable. While 5G technology is presumed to be data speed increase, app developers can leverage the technology to provide some critical benefits to users like lower latency, improved connection density, faster data transfer.

With such phenomenal takeaways, 5G is considered to be one of the major game changers of life.

7. Mobile wallets

The growing popularity of payment apps has necessitated the importance of using mobile wallet applications as they help users to perform transactions on the go.

They power users with convenience of paying through mobile devices with impeccable security. They are considered to be more secure on the cards. In short, mobile wallets apps are easy to use and transact. 

8. Mobile app security

The growing rate of mobile data hacks and phishing activities reveal the security of applications needs to be improved. 

No industry would like to shy away from the learning about the mobile app security trends. A few of them in 2020 include adaptive mobile app security, protecting sensitive data, protection against phishing, encryption types etc. 

9. Instant apps (native apps)

Instant apps are wonderful options for the uses as they can be downloaded directly from Playstore. The availability of instant apps has helped users in recent years and the trend is all set to continue.

Of the many benefits, some of the benefits of using instant app development for enterprise users are ease of access, freedom to creativity, test & validate before use, save space, save time and easy to share. 

10. On-demand applications

The arrival of on-demand apps have transformed the way we live. Think about Uber, LYFT, TaskRabbit etc. They offer high comfort and ease of access to users. In 2020, many entrepreneurs will focus on developing on-demand applications to boost RoI. Some of the benefits on-demand apps offer to enterprise users are mobility advantage, employee satisfaction, improved scalability, scaled up business opportunities, cost-effectiveness. 

These are not the only trends that will dominate the business landscape in 2020 and beyond. But, these are some of the top trends that will create an impact on businesses and their users.