The Case for Native Apps

Every app I build is native Swift and SwiftUI. No React Native, no Flutter, no cross-platform frameworks. People sometimes ask why, especially when cross-platform tools have gotten so good.

The short answer: feel. Native apps feel different. The scrolling physics, the haptic feedback, the way animations sync with gestures — these things are hard to replicate in a cross-platform layer. When you're building tools that people use every day, those micro-interactions compound into an experience that either feels right or feels off.

The longer answer involves SwiftUI specifically. It's the most productive UI framework I've ever used. Declarative, reactive, and deeply integrated with the platform. When Apple ships a new API — Camera Control on iPhone 16, FoundationModels for on-device AI — you can adopt it on day one. No waiting for a bridge or a plugin.

The tradeoff is obvious: I can only ship on Apple platforms. For the apps I build — personal tools, creative utilities, productivity aids — that's fine. My users are iPhone and Mac users. If I were building a social network or a B2B SaaS product, the calculus would be different.

But for now, native is home.