Among some of the biggest names in the world of technology, Google has been innovating various aspects of markets of technology over the years. One such innovation has been that of the instant apps. Google had announced the arrival of Android Instant Apps back in the Google I/O 2016 last summer. However, they were almost forgotten till a few days ago when the news broke out that testing has begun for these instant apps. Let us now take a detailed look at what they are and how they function.
What Are Android Instant Apps:
Instant Apps, to sum things up in short, are apps that a user can use without having to download them! While this sounds absurd at the moment, this is all set to be the future of Android technology as we know it to be. An OS is as good as its apps are. Android certainly has no lack of apps. However, at times the size matters and users hesitate to download big apps, especially if they are on a slower connection, or on data connection.
Let us now take a look at how the Android Instant Apps work: When a user clicks a deep link associated with an Instant App, they will instantly be taken to an app-version of website. Instant Apps function similar to how the Instant articles do on Facebook – at least in terms of speed! At times they might even open faster than an actual mobile website! What makes it special is that there are no downloads needed to run these apps. This has a major benefit when it comes to user acquisition.
Benefits of Instant Apps:
Instant apps are beneficial to multiple kinds of users. Let us take a look at who benefits from this, and how:
- App Developers: Android Instant Apps make the process of user acquisition much easier than ever before. In the past users had to go to the play store, download and install an app, and that app would not only consume data but also occupy space on their phone. The Instant Apps have none of these problems as the app would launch at a simple tap, or by scanning the QR code, or even via NFC.
- Reduces Duplication of Efforts: Another benefit of Android Instant Apps is that it reduces the duplication of efforts. At times when the users would visit a mobile site, it would show them a message ‘open in app’. Now, this would lead to directly redirecting the user to the Instant Apps! This would not break users’ chain of thought and might result in more benefits for e-commerce apps.
- Responsiveness: When compared to mobile web, the Android Instant Apps are bound to be more custom, flexible and responsive as to provide the users with a better experience. Moreover, users don’t even need to worry about storage space issues anymore. From a UX perspective this is indeed a very big plus.
