website or app? how to decide

"We need an app" is one of the most common things we hear, and one of the most expensive to get wrong. Apps are powerful, but they cost more to build, take longer to ship, and need to be found, downloaded and kept on someone's phone.

Before choosing, answer these four questions.

1. How often will people come back?

If your customers use you daily or weekly (ordering, tracking, logging, messaging), an app earns its place on the home screen.

If they visit a few times before buying, or once a month, a fast website will serve them better. Nobody installs an app to read about a service once.

2. Do you need the phone itself?

Push notifications, the camera, offline use, location in the background, Bluetooth. If the core of your idea depends on these, that points to an app.

If it is mostly reading, browsing, booking and paying, the browser does all of that well today.

3. How will people find you?

Websites are found through search, links and shares. Apps are found through app stores, which mostly reward apps that are already popular.

If you are starting out, a website is usually the better way to get discovered.

4. What is the smallest version that proves the idea?

This is the most useful question. Very often the honest answer is a well-built web app: something that works on any phone, ships in weeks instead of months, and can become a native app once people are clearly using it.

A simple rule of thumb

• Start with a website if you need to be found, explain an offer, or take bookings and payments.
• Start with a web app if you are testing a product idea with real users.
• Go native when people already use you often and the phone's features are central to the experience.

Not sure which one you are? Pick "Something else" on the home page and describe it in a sentence. We will tell you straight, even if the answer is the cheaper option.