Updating Your iOS App

Updating Your iOS App

Updating Your iOS App: Top 8 Current Trends to Implement in 2023

To keep your iOS app ahead of its competitors, you need to keep up with current trends in every update. From new features to new ways of debugging, keeping up with current trends can help your mobile app business succeed. So, this article covers the top 6 trends you can implement into your iOS app in 2023:

AI and ML Integration

One of the most popular trends in mobile app development today is the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) capabilities. By leveraging AI and ML, apps can provide personalized experiences to users, automate tasks, and make data-driven decisions.

For example, AI-powered chatbots can help users navigate through an app’s features and provide assistance with common inquiries. ML algorithms can be used to analyze user behavior and preferences, and then suggest personalized content or products.

Wearable App Integration

As wearable technology becomes more ubiquitous, it’s important for iOS apps to support integration with devices like smartwatches and fitness trackers. By doing so, users can access app features and receive notifications directly on their wearable devices, without needing to pull out their phones.

For example, a fitness app can integrate with an Apple Watch to track a user’s heart rate, distance traveled, and calories burned. A messaging app can send notifications to a user’s wrist, allowing them to quickly read and respond to messages without having to pull out their phone.

IoT Connectivity

The Internet of Things (IoT) refers to the interconnected network of devices that are able to communicate with one another. Integrating an iOS app with IoT devices can provide users with seamless and intuitive experiences.

For example, a smart home app can integrate with IoT-enabled devices like smart thermostats and lighting systems, allowing users to control their home environment with just a few taps on their phone. A retail app can leverage IoT beacons to deliver personalized promotions and discounts to users as they navigate through a physical store.

Cloud Integration

Cloud integration allows developers to take advantage of the scalability and flexibility of cloud-based infrastructure. By integrating their apps with cloud services, developers can offload some tasks, such as data storage and computation, to powerful cloud-based servers. This can help improve app performance and reliability. It also allows for new features and capabilities not possible with traditional, on-premises infrastructure.

You can integrate an iOS app with cloud services using CloudKit. CloudKit is a framework provided by Apple that allows developers to easily integrate their apps with the company’s cloud-based services.

Using CloudKit, developers can take advantage of services such as CloudKit Database and CloudKit Assets. These two services allow developers to store and retrieve structured data as well as store and retrieve large binary files.

CloudKit also provides features for authenticating users, such as support for Apple ID and iCloud accounts. This means developers can easily authenticate users and access their data without managing their authentication infrastructure.

CloudKit provides a way to perform server-side operations using CloudKit Web Services. This allows developers to execute code on the server, even when the user’s device is offline.

Augmented Reality

Developers can use Augmented reality (AR) to enhance the user experience and create more engaging and interactive apps. With the introduction of ARKit 6, the framework for developing AR apps, the creation of AR experiences is more accessible for developers.

You can use AR to improve your iOS app in several ways, such as:

• Enhancing the user interface: AR can create interactive and engaging user interfaces. For example, an app that uses AR to visualize product information in a way that is more engaging than reading text and looking at images on a screen.
• Enhancing the user experience: AR can be used to create an experience that is more immersive and interactive. For example, an AR app to create an interactive game or a virtual museum tour.
• Enhancing education: AR can improve educational apps and make them more engaging and interactive. For example, an app that uses AR to create virtual labs for students can allow them to interact with virtual equipment and experiments.

Although AR features require high transfer speeds, the increasing popularity of 5G technology can accommodate these high demands.

Chatbots

With the advancement in natural language processing (NLP) technology and machine learning, chatbots have become incredibly powerful. They can respond intelligently, understand a user’s inputs, and offer a human-like chatting experience. By implementing a chatbot into your iOS app, you can improve your user’s experience by offering the following:

• Customer service: Provide automated customer service with chatbots that answer frequently asked questions, provide information, or troubleshoot issues. This can free up human customer service representatives’ time to handle more complex problems while providing a more convenient way for users to get the help they need.
• Personalization: Chatbots can personalize the app experience by providing personalized recommendations, offers, or messages based on a user’s behavior and preferences. This can improve user engagement and experience.
• Automation: Using chatbots, you can automate repetitive or simple tasks for the user, such as scheduling appointments, placing an order, or making a reservation, reducing the need for the user to navigate through the app or website.

You can also use chatbots to accommodate voice commands.

App Transport Security

Apple continues to prioritize security within all apps and now requires additional security layers as part of its iOS 14 update for the mobile apps listed on the Apple app store.

App Transport Security (ATS) ensures encryption for all network connections using HTTPS. This helps protect the data of an app’s users from being intercepted and read by third parties. It also validates the certificate of the server the app connects to, which helps prevent man-in-the-middle attacks by ensuring that the app connects to the server it intended to connect to. On top of this, ATS also prevents protocol downgrade attacks by only allowing the use of the latest and most secure encryption protocols. It blocks apps from connecting to servers without a valid SSL certificate or that use a weaker encryption protocol.

While implementing ATS may require some level of configuration and adjustments from the developers, Apple requires it for your app to be listed in the app store.

Predictive Analytics

Although your app might not use predictive analytics, you and your developers can use predictive analytics to improve your processes. Predictive analytics allows developers to use data and machine learning algorithms to gain insights, predict future events or behavior, and make data-driven decisions.

Predictive analytics offers a wide variety of uses in the mobile app development space, including:

• Identifying and predicting user behavior patterns: Using predictive analytics, developers can quickly analyze user behavior data and identify patterns and trends. This can help see exactly how users interact with the app.
• Optimizing marketing and sales efforts: Beyond mobile app development, predictive analytics also offers a method for analyzing marketing and sales data to identify patterns and predict future outcomes. With these data-based predictions, you can optimize your marketing and sales efforts and make better decisions about where to focus your resources.
• Improving app performance: By analyzing performance data and predicting how an app behaves in different scenarios, predictive analytics can help identify bottlenecks, expect future performance issues, and optimize an app accordingly.

With the help of predictive analytics, developers and development studios can create more personalized, efficient, and effective apps.

Implementing these eight trends into your iOS app can help set it up for success in 2023. Call NCN Technology to learn more about updating your iOS app.