Most businesses need a fast website that works well on phones, not a mobile app. Build an app when people use your service weekly or daily, need alerts they must not miss, or need phone features like location, the camera, or offline use. Otherwise, the money is better spent on your website.
An app sounds like the modern choice, and a competitor having one can make it feel urgent. But an app has to earn a place on someone's phone: they have to find it, install it, and keep it. For many businesses, customers visit a few times a year, and a good mobile website serves them better. Below: five questions that decide it, a middle option most people miss, four real projects, what each option costs, and the order most businesses should build in.
Mobile app or website: the short answer
A website is enough when
People visit, then leave
- People visit to learn, book, or buy, then leave
- Most new customers find you on Google
- Nothing needs the phone's camera, location, or offline use
- Customers use it monthly or less
You need an app when
People use it all the time
- People use it weekly or daily, often on the move
- Alerts they must not miss are part of the service
- The phone does something a browser can't do well
- Your users are existing customers or staff, not strangers
The cut
"It feels like a website" is not a reason to build an app. That complaint usually means the site is slow or awkward on a phone, which is cheaper to fix on the website itself.
Five questions that decide if you need an app
- How often do people use it?Weekly or daily use justifies an icon on the home screen. A few visits a year doesn't.
- Do they need alerts they must not miss?An order ready, a route changed, breaking news. Marketing messages don't count.
- Does the phone do something the website can't? Tracking location in the background, scanning with the camera, working without a signal, or connecting to a device.
- Where are they when they use it? On the move points to an app. At a desk points to a web app.
- Are they new or existing customers? New customers find you through search, so they need the website. Apps serve people who already chose you.
Two or more answers pointing to an app is a good sign. None usually means the website is the better investment.
The middle option: a web app on the home screen
There's a step between a website and an app store app that many businesses skip. A web app can be saved to a phone's home screen, open full screen like an app, and send notifications, with no store review or fees. It's often called a progressive web app, or PWA.
On iPhones, web push notifications arrived in iOS 16.4, but only for web apps the user has added to their home screen, which is an extra step many people never take. So a home screen web app suits existing customers you can guide through it. It's weaker when you need reliable alerts for everyone, a presence in the app stores, or deep phone features. It's a sensible way to test demand for an app before paying for one.
How to test if customers want an app before building one
You don't have to guess. Before paying for an app, check what your customers already do:
- Look at your analytics. What share of visits come from phones, and how many visitors return every week? Frequent returning visitors on phones are the people an app would serve.
- Ask your best customers.Not "would you like an app?", since most people say yes. Ask what they'd do in it, and how often.
- Offer the home screen version first. If few customers add your web app to their home screen, few will install a store app either.
- Add a waiting list.A simple "get the app first" sign-up on your site shows real interest at almost no cost.
If these show weekly use and real demand, an app is a good investment. If not, you've saved the budget for something your customers will actually use.
Four real projects, with and without an app
An app that earned its place: local news
The local news apppasses almost every test: people check it daily, breaking news arrives as push alerts, and stories are picked by the reader's location. It has 50K downloads and 20K monthly readers on iOS and Android.
An app for people on the move: a distributor catalog
A printing and imaging brand needed distributors to show products to customers from their phones, in the field. That's daily use, on the move, by people who already work with the brand. A three-week prototype app came first, so it could be tested before the full build.
No app needed: a business card platform and a clinic
The digital business card platform has 30K+ users without an app: tapping a card opens a web page, so anyone can view a profile without installing anything. Easy Pawsy, a vet clinic, gets around 80% of its bookings from Google. An app wouldn't have brought those visitors in; a fast mobile website did.
What each option costs
| Option | Cost | Best when |
|---|---|---|
| Website that works well on phones | Part of a $8,000–22,000 site | Most businesses |
| Website wrapped as an app | $4,000–12,000 | Existing customers want an icon and alerts |
| App on your existing backend | $25,000–55,000 | A web product already works and people use it often |
| App as the main product | $45,000–90,000 | The phone is where the whole service happens |
A wrapped website is the cheapest store listing, but Apple's review guidelines reject apps that are little more than a repackaged website, so it works best for web products people log into. The full breakdown, with store fees, is in what a mobile app costs.
Mistakes businesses make with mobile apps
- An app instead of a good mobile website. New customers still arrive through the browser, so a weak site costs you either way.
- An app before the product works. Two store reviews and release processes, before you know if anyone wants it.
- A separate system for the app. Different accounts or data from the website means two products to keep in sync.
- Expecting the store to bring customers. Most installs come from people who already know you.
- Wrapping a marketing site. Likely to be rejected by Apple, and slower than the website it copies.
Each of these spends app money on a problem the website, or a simpler first version, would have solved.
The usual order: website, web app, then mobile app
For most businesses, the order that wastes the least money is:
- A fast website that works well on phones, so new customers can find you and act.
- A web app, if customers or staff need to log in and do a job. See website or web app.
- A mobile app, once people use the web app often enough to want it in their pocket, built on the same backend.
Skipping ahead is sometimes right: a delivery service or a field team tool may need the app from day one. But each step makes the next one cheaper, and tells you whether it's needed at all. What belongs in each first release is in what to put in a first version.
A checklist before you commission an app
If you can tick most of these, an app is probably worth it. If not, the next step is usually the website. See how I build apps on my mobile apps page, or tell me what your users need to do, and I'll give you a straight answer.
Sources
- Web Push for web apps on iOS and iPadOS 16.4, WebKit (Apple)
- App Review Guidelines 4.2: minimum functionality, Apple
