Tom Hardy
In the past few years, the use of mobile phones has skyrocketed. The digital world is very volatile and the one which provides the best services than the others stays in the game. Keeping up with the soaring competition has become a matter of survival today.
New technologies are being introduced, which are making the digital world more exciting and competitive. In this post, we are going to discuss two such technologies: Progressive web apps (PWA) and accelerated mobile pages (AMP). They are designed to provide faster and richer mobile experiences to web users.
Soon after their introduction, these technologies have won the hearts of the users due to their ability to provide fast access to web content. Moreover, when we compare these two technologies, can we figure out which one is the best between them? Let’s try to understand the differences between PWA and AMP as well as try to figure out which one is better between them.
What is a progressive web app (PWA)?
A PWA is a website that is designed to look, feel and work like a native mobile application. A user can install a PWA on his mobile and use like he does a native app. The app is available from a web browser as the user visits the website where a prompt is shown to install the app to mobile device. It provides notifications to the users like a native app does and can work offline due to caching.
What is an accelerated mobile pages (AMP)?
Accelerated mobile pages is an open-source project, which aims to create web pages that load instantly in the browsers of the users. There are some improvements in the HTML, CSS, and JavaScript that help to make these AMP pages. Developers need to include AMP code into the website code and minimize the use of HTML and CSS as well as it restricts the use of JavaScript. CDN is used for delivering content over the network, which is first cached before delivering to the user.
Difference between PWA and AMP
As you can understand from the above definitions, they both are two different technologies. Progressive web apps enable the users to utilize a lightweight application on the smartphone which works like its native counterpart. On the other hand, an accelerated mobile page is the web page which is optimized with stripped down HTML and CSS code and restricted JavaScript. AMP is designed for mobile users, which provides them web pages that load almost instantly and offer a faster web experience to the users.
Pros and cons of progressive web apps and accelerated mobile pages
Let’s take a look at the different pros and cons of these two technologies.
Pros of PWA
- It saves a lot of space because its size is only a few KBs.
- No need to update repeatedly, it’s always fresh.
- A user needs not visit the app store to install the app.
- It’s best for e-commerce websites.
Cons of PWA
- Cannot access full mobile features like a native app.
- Battery consumption may be high for PWAs.
Pros of AMP
- Supports ads facility.
- AMP pages load very quickly offering faster web experience.
- Diminish the server load and improve its performance.
- They are very useful for publisher-based sites.
- They have a positive impact on the overall SEO on mobiles.
Cons of AMP
- It’s not possible to track user activities on AMP.
- They work only on cache basis.
- They might not be useful for e-commerce websites.
- The overall search ranking of a site may not increase.
Which one is the best: Progressive web apps & Accelerated mobile pages?
Although both of these technologies are different from each other, but you have understand that using them together can work best for your business. If your website is served through HTTPS, then it’s essential to use both of these technologies to provide your website’s visitor a lot better experience.
By understanding the implications of both Google AMP and PWA for your business, you can utilize them aptly to serve your visitors wisely. In combination, both PWA and AMP can help you enhance the web experience of your visitors.
An accelerated mobile page is the best way to serve your customers with faster web content. Similarly, you can provide the best user experience to your site visitors by using a progressive web app. The most important of these technologies is that they work even in places where network connectivity is a problem.
In case of a PWA, a user can access the web content anytime even without an internet connection once it is cached on the user’s mobile. Similarly, AMP makes a website load quickly even if the network is slow. You should add both these technologies to your development plan.
Disagree AMP isn’t useful for ecommerce. While it may have been true at the beginning of AMP, the framework has made a lot of strides in ecommerce support and ecommerce case studies have been a focus of the last few AMP conferences.
The short answer to PWA vs. AMP is that you need both. In fact, Google’s recommend customer journey is that the user transitions from an AMP result to a PWA so that the entire customer journey can be as fast as possible.