Monday, April 9, 2018

Native Apps in China

Luming Yin:

In America, mainstream native desktop (macOS or Windows) are in decline, and developers increasingly opt for building web apps or Electron apps. However, web apps vs. native desktop apps is a completely different story in companies such as China.

Music streaming: In the U.S., apart from AM/iTunes, no major music app is native. Spotify is Electron, Tidal is Electron, Amazon Prime and YT Music are web only. In China, all 4 major providers (QQ, Netease, Kugou, Kuwo) have native Mac apps, and they're all surprisingly good.

Social apps: Facebook Messenger has no Mac app, but both WeChat and QQ do. Slack is Electron-based, but WeChat Work is native, even supporting screen broadcasting. Twitter pulled its Mac app, but Weibo continues its support. So, native app for every mainstream Chinese platform.

3 Comments RSS · Twitter


With less respect to copyright and patents they have more competition in some areas, where companies have to have better features.


Amazon Prime and YT Music are web only.

Um, no?

https://www.amazon.com/Amazon-Digital-Services-LLC-ACPforPC/dp/B00CTTEKJW

There's even a Store version.

https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2018/02/13/amazon-music-windows-10-available-now-microsoft-store/

If you told me it was Electron, I'd believe you, but it's certainly not web only. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯


Looks like he knows now, and that Amazon Music is Chromium.

https://twitter.com/lumingyin/status/982411721984880640?s=21

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