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Android apps are developed faster

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Harmeet
New Update

SANTA CRUZ, USA: It takes less time to develop apps for the Android platform than for either iOS or Windows Phone, according to Evans Data's newly released Mobile Development Survey, an in-depth worldwide survey of 464 developers actively developing apps for mobile devices.

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Forty-one percent of developers targeting Android said their typical app is finished in one month or less compared to 36 percent for iOS and 34 percent for Windows Phone.

On all platforms, the largest part of the time is spent on testing and debugging except for Firefox and Tizen, where coding takes more time. Android developers also spend the most time on testing and debugging but spend proportionately more time than developers for other platforms on performance and UI optimization.

Android, which surpassed iOS in Spring of 2011 as the top development target for smartphones, is also targeted by more developers than any other operating system for tablets. Eighty-four percent of those targeting tablets target Android compared to 62 percent targeting iOS and 52 percent targeting Windows.

However, most developers target multiple platforms and they also target multiple screen sizes. Seventy-four percent emulate screen sizes before they ship their apps and all but 28 percent say that more than a quarter of the apps they write are designed for multiple screen sizes.

"Targeting multiple screen sizes is definitely the way to go," said Janel Garvin, CEO of Evans Data. "The benefit of having your app run across the gamut of device types is obvious, and while there are difficulties in synchronization across device types, and in the range of graphics capabilities that are supported by different screens, the benefits still outweigh the effort."

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