The Comparison between React Native vs Kotlin [Updated Guide 2023-24]

Statistics show that there are more than 5.7 million applications when combined on both the Apple App Store and Google Play Store. Mobile app development has seen a rapid increase in recent years, especially in the post-covid era.

Now, businesses from all walks of life need to build mobile apps to widen their reach to end-users. However, Mobile apps are essential; creating separate apps for each platform may be maddening, and that’s where cross-platform mobile app development comes into play.

There are many frameworks and programming languages used by mobile app development companies to build cross-platform apps that run on iOS and Android, but ascertaining one for you may be difficult. Let’s Explore React Native Vs. Kotlin in this article!

React Native vs. Kotlin: Introduction

Before heading to mobile app development, an overview of the tools used by mobile app development companies can give you a complete take on which one of the tools to choose for your project. However, it’s not possible to cover all of them at once; you can do it one by one. In this article, we have come up with an intensive assessment of React Native vs Kotlin. So, let’s get started from the basics first, which is an introduction to React Native and Kotlin!

React Native Vs Kotlin: Features

Pros and cons of React Native and Kotlin

Now that we have discussed what’s React Native and Kotlin along with their features let’s get into the exploration of their pros and cons!

Pros and cons of React Native

Pros and Cons of Kotlin

React Native Vs. Kotlin: When to Choose What?

Choose React Native When_

Choose Kotlin When_

React Native vs. Kotlin: A Brief Comparison Table

Until now, we’d had a sneak peek at both React Native and Kotlin from different perspectives, for instance, their kinds, features, pros and cons, and when to use them. Now, we’re up to move further and conduct an intensive exploration of both technologies. But before we dig deeper, let’s take a glance at this comparison table on React Native Vs. Kotlin below!

React Native vs. Kotlin: An In-Depth Comparison

React Native and Kotlin are the two top mobile app development frameworks in the tech arena. Now that we have become aware of the basics of React Native and Kotlin, it’s time we start digging deeper to explore them a bit more intensively. Here’s a detailed comparison of both technologies on various parameters to help you get a good grasp on them and make an appropriate selection of technology for mobile app development.

Performance

Let’s embark on the comparison journey with performance! First off, React Native ensures developers have a native-like experience when app development. The framework allows developers to create applications making use of JavaScript and native modules. Moreover, React Native enables developers to build scalable applications in no time for both Android and iOS platforms.

Kotlin, on the other hand, enables you to create a platforms-specific codebase and share business logic that’s created in the programming language. When it comes to comparing React Native Vs Kotlin based on performance, applications created using Kotlin deliver standout performance but can’t outperform apps built using React Native.

Popularity

There are plenty of users out there of both React Native and Kotlin, but the question here is which one stays ahead of the curve when it comes to popularity? React Native tends to eliminate the reiteration of the task from the app development cycle, resulting in speeding up the app development procedure. Furthermore, it enables developers to create a single codebase for different platforms, which saves them a huge chunk of time and resources, too. There are reputed names, including Facebook, Instagram, Airnab, Discord, Bloomberg, Ads, Uber Eats, and the like, that avail React Native.

When it comes to the popularity of Kotlin, it, too, enjoys a huge chunk of popularity. There are organizations, including Amazon, Twitter, Netflix, Pinterest, and the like, that employ Kotlin to create their Android apps. Since both of the platforms have their own level of popularity, it’s somewhat difficult to ascertain which one is more popular.

Convenience of Development

Now, we’re to compare React Native Vs. Kotlin is based on ease of development. An experienced developer can simply make use of the Native UI with JavaScript for app development for both Android and iOS with a single codebase. Plenty of attributes, including ready-to-use components, a hot reloading feature, and native development competencies, make React Native developer-friendly for app creation.

On the other hand, Kotlin allows developers to reuse multi-platform logic and create platform-specific code bases as per the requirements. This results in accelerating the whole development lifecycle, which makes it a hassle-free and convenient platform for app development.

Ease of Learning Curve

React Native makes use of JavaScript and robust libraries; however, it has a steep learning curve enabling you to learn and use it with ease. Developers with ideas and experience working with JavaScript would find it way more convenient to learn React Native for cross-platform application development. Apart from that, because of the framework’s wider adoption, finding React Native developers is easier.

Kotlin, on the other hand, too, has a shallow learning curve making it easier for development to make use of it. Kotlin is entirely interoperable with Java; hence, developers across the world find it easy to learn and work with Kotlin for building high-performance applications.

App Development Time & Cost

If you’re someone keeping your eyes out for building mobile applications at a limited investment in reduced time, React Native can be an excellent choice. The technology is a consummate choice for businesses with budget constraints. It can be an exemplary alternative for MVC development and prototyping.

In the same way, Kotlin allows developers to build high-performance applications at a breakneck speed with limited resources, which ensures delivering streamlined performance. The technology should be an appropriate alternative for businesses with budget constraints. In Kotlin, it takes just a few lines to create and deploy well-functional codes, resulting in a mitigated application development time compared to that of React Native.

Development Environment

In general, a platform that holds fewer hoops and jumps is likely to be the right choice. You can create an application with React Native with any text editor or IDE. It’s a gesture that you can ask your developer to make use of the text editor you like. Furthermore, you can have a seamless experience of installing React Native through the NPM package manager, which hardly takes more than three hours.

Kotlin, on the other hand, provides the flexibility of creating a multitude of IDEs and text editors through IntelliJ IDEA. Besides, the installation and setting up procedure in Kotlin is unlikely to take much time resulting in a mitigated time for app development.

Tech Stack

Being a JavaScript framework, React Native provides all of its development on JavaScript. Moreover, the technology renders a user interface making use of the JSX syntax, a JavaScript technology that ensures providing all the benefits of JavaScript programming language. It means you need to know JavaScript if you want to employ React Native for your project.

Kotlin, on the contrary, is a programming language used to create mobile applications. It allows you to create native code for your Android apps which interacts with native device hardware and has complete access to it while the app is being created. From this point of view, however, both React Native and Kotlin will restrict your competencies to make use of tools during app development.

Wider Community Support

Whether you compare React Native with Swift or Kotlin, the former is winner against all its competitors. When it comes to the community, React Native has an immensely large community that ensures its users have complete support when needed. The React Native documentation, however, should suffice your need to embark; there are tons of tutorials, blogs, and online courses available, which you can avail of if you wish to gain extensive knowledge and information about the very framework.

Being new to the marketplace, Kotlin has a limited community and library, which means you can expect restricted support from its community. The community isn’t that large; however, it’s continuously evolving to reach a new height and develop robust community support.

Well-Known Applications Developed with React Native and Kotlin

However, there’s a wide array of applications out there built using React Native and Kotlin; the following are some of the top applications built using React and Kotlin! Consider taking a sneak peek at ’em!

Companies using React Native

Companies using Kotlin

Signing Off….!

That’s all about React Native vs Kotlin comparison. In this article, we conducted a comprehensive comparison of both of the technologies from different aspects. It includes what React Native and Kotlin are, their features, pros and cons, and when to use them, along with a detailed comparison based on a variety of parameters. Hopefully, it helps you ease your tech selection during app development! If you have some more questions to be answered, consider a brief glance at the FAQs given below.

Compare these two technologies and hire dedicated developers for your projects. Based on the comparison, if you have a project suitable to React Native, hire React Native developers or go with Kotlin developers. Meanwhile, you can also connect with us for a free consultation or build new app from scratch.

FAQs

Is Kotlin native or cross-platform?

Kotlin is an SDK (software development kit) for creating applications for both iOS and Android. It provides the combined advantages of creating native as well as cross-platform applications.

React Vs. Kotlin: Which would be the right suit for my project?

In short, React Native is a more efficient choice for building cross-platform mobile apps. It’s an excellent framework that is easy to learn and use and offers seamless performance. The majority of techies agree upon the fact that React Native is going to be the future of cross-platform mobile app development.

Is Kotlin similar to React Native?

React Native enables you to create native iOS, Android, and UWP applications using a single codebase. On the other hand, Kotlin acts as an alternative to the RN framework— it allows you to create a UI employing native standard libraries.

Can we use React Native and Kotlin hand-in-hand?

Yes, you can use React Native and Kotlin together to bridge Kotlin in apps built based on React Native.

Which one of the two (React Native Vs. Kotlin) is cheaper or costlier than the other?

However, the cost to build your mobile app immensely depends and varies based on what you require; app development, in general, would cost you less when using React Native than that of Kotlin.

React Native Vs. Kotlin: which one should I learn?

For a cross-platform application, React Native performs exceptionally well. React Native is scalable; however, Kotlin, too, has some advantages over it. When your developers don’t have experience in cross-platform application development, Kotlin should be the right choice.