Flutter is an open-source UI software development toolkit created by Google. It is used to develop cross-platform applications for mobile, web, and desktop from a single codebase. Here's an overview of what Flutter is and its key features:
Key Components
Dart Language: Flutter applications are written in Dart, a language also developed by Google. Dart is designed for fast performance and productivity, making it suitable for both frontend and backend development.
Widgets: Flutter uses a rich set of customizable widgets to build user interfaces. Everything in Flutter is a widget, from layout structures to UI components, enabling high flexibility and consistency in design.
Flutter Engine: The engine is written in C++ and provides low-level rendering support using Google’s Skia graphics library, giving Flutter its high performance and smooth graphics capabilities.
Why Companies Use Flutter
Cross-Platform Development means a single code base and consistent UI across platforms
Faster Development The Hot Reload feature significantly saves development time and extensive collection of pre-designed widgets helps you simply assemble widgets instead of creating them.
High Performance due to native compilation and optimized rendering of graphics and animation the UI responds much faster than with many other frameworks.
Expressive and Flexible UI - Customizable widgets and support for both Material and Cupertino design standards
Strong Community - Flutter is open-source, which means it is freely available for anyone to use, contribute to, and customize. There is a huge community of developers contributes regularly to build plugins and packages, continuously evolving the capabilities of the language
Cost-Effective Maintenance - You not only build once, you also only maintain a single code base thereby keeping your maintenance cost low
Developed by Google: As a Google product, Flutter benefits from robust support, continuous development, and integration with other Google services and products.
What Do They Use It For
Many notable companies have transitioned to Flutter, especially for mobile app development. This is not an exhaustive list but just a few notable ones just to show what people are building with Flutter.
Google: Apps built using Flutter at Google are Google Ads, Google Cloud Admin App, YouTube Create, Google Earth 10, Google Pay and so on.
Alibaba, Tencent and Bytedance: The popular e-commerce companies Alibaba and Tencent both use Flutter for some of their apps (Xianyu, Now). Similarly Bytedance who owns TikTok also uses Flutter extensively across multiple apps. According to Flutter.dev, Bytedance employs about 700 Flutter developers.
Reflectly: An AI-driven journal app that provides a seamless user experience on both iOS and Android.
Disney and Universal Studios: Both companies use Flutter extensively for their mobile apps.
BMW, Toyota and Volkswagen: Toyota has transitioned to Flutter for its infotainment system, BMW uses Flutter for its My BMW app across multiple platforms and Volkswagen uses Flutter for its ride hailing service MOIA (source).
Capital One, Societe Generale, Nubank, ING Bank: Several banks use Flutter across many apps
SAS Airlines: Scandinavian Airlines is the flag carrier of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. Their client application to purchase tickets and organize trips is built with Flutter.
Grab and Delivery Hero: Grab uses Flutter for its driver app, benefiting from Flutter’s performance and fast development cycle. Delivery Hero helps restaurants to be connected to suppliers, their platform has been developed with Flutter
eBay and Realtor.com: The eBay Motors app leverages Flutter for its intuitive and interactive user interface. Realtor.com uses Flutter for its real estate app, offering a unified and visually appealing platform for home buyers and renters
In Conclusion..
Flutter is a powerful and versatile framework that allows developers to create high-quality, performant applications across multiple platforms from a single codebase. Its combination of fast development, expressive UI, and strong performance makes it an excellent choice for modern app development.
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