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  1. Stackups
  2. Application & Data
  3. Frameworks
  4. Cross Platform Mobile Development
  5. Ionic vs Onsen UI

Ionic vs Onsen UI

OverviewDecisionsComparisonAlternatives

Overview

Ionic
Ionic
Stacks9.5K
Followers8.6K
Votes1.8K
Onsen UI
Onsen UI
Stacks40
Followers136
Votes11
GitHub Stars8.9K
Forks1.0K

Ionic vs Onsen UI: What are the differences?

  1. Architecture: The key difference between Ionic and Onsen UI lies in their architecture. Ionic follows a web-first approach, using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, while Onsen UI is built on top of native components for a more native feel and performance.
  2. Components: Ionic offers a wide range of pre-built components that are optimized for mobile devices, providing a robust toolkit for developers. Onsen UI, on the other hand, focuses more on simplicity and flexibility, with fewer out-of-the-box components but allowing for more customization.
  3. Styling: Ionic comes with a default material design theme, making it easy to create modern-looking applications, while Onsen UI allows for greater theming options and flexibility in customizing the appearance of the app.
  4. Community Support: Ionic has a larger and more active community, which can be beneficial for developers seeking help, resources, and updates. Onsen UI, although not as large, still has a dedicated user base and support system.
  5. Performance: Due to its architecture and utilization of native components, Onsen UI typically offers better performance and smoother transitions compared to Ionic, which relies more on web technologies.
  6. Pricing: Ionic offers a free and open-source version with additional premium features available through a subscription-based model, while Onsen UI has a free version and offers enterprise-level support and features to paying customers.

In Summary, the key differences between Ionic and Onsen UI lie in their architecture, components, styling, community support, performance, and pricing.

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Advice on Ionic, Onsen UI

Anonymous
Anonymous

CEO at ME!

Jun 7, 2020

Decided

While with Ionic it is possible to make mobile applications with only web technologies, Flutter is more performant and is easy to use if you are willing to learn Dart, which is a fun language. Plus, it has awesome documentation and, while its ecosystem isn't near as big as JavaScript's is, it has a good package manager called Pub and its packages are generally high quality.

403k views403k
Comments
Thuan
Thuan

FE Lead at SOLID ENGINEER

Jun 16, 2020

Decided
  • Javascripts is the most populated language in the world.
  • Easy to learn & deployed production
  • Fast development
  • Strong community
  • Completed Documents
  • Native performance with lower RAM used.
  • Easy to handle native issues by using native code like Java / Objective C
  • Powered by Facebook.
666k views666k
Comments
Pierre
Pierre

Responsable app mobile at Le Point

Feb 9, 2021

Decided

I've made 6 professional/business applications with React Native before choosing Flutter/Dart for the new version of WinMinuteConso (historical in Ionic...). Multi Platform is far more stable, Dart is far more powerful, the whole process is really better... It is just hard to find the proper software architecture...

134k views134k
Comments

Detailed Comparison

Ionic
Ionic
Onsen UI
Onsen UI

Free and open source, Ionic offers a library of mobile and desktop-optimized HTML, CSS and JS components for building highly interactive apps. Use with Angular, React, Vue, or plain JavaScript.

Onsen UI helps you develop both hybrid and web apps. If developing hybrid apps, you can use it with the Cordova / PhoneGap command line, or with Monaca tools (CLI, Monaca IDE - cloud-based IDE for Cordova, Localkit - desktop GUI).

Performance obsessed;Utilizes Angular and React;Native focused;Beautifully designed;Based on Web Components;
Open source HTML5 hybrid app framework for PhoneGap & Cordova; JavaScript framework agnostic; Mobile-optimized HTML5, CSS and JavaScript with Web components; UI framework; Responsive layout; Material and Flat design; Comprehensive toolset (CLI, IDE, debugger, remote build etc.) provided as Monaca
Statistics
GitHub Stars
-
GitHub Stars
8.9K
GitHub Forks
-
GitHub Forks
1.0K
Stacks
9.5K
Stacks
40
Followers
8.6K
Followers
136
Votes
1.8K
Votes
11
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 248
    Allows for rapid prototyping
  • 228
    Hybrid mobile
  • 208
    It's angularjs
  • 186
    Free
  • 179
    It's javascript, html, and css
Cons
  • 20
    Not suitable for high performance or UI intensive apps
  • 15
    Not meant for game development
  • 2
    Not a native app
Pros
  • 3
    Works with any JavaScript framework
  • 3
    Allows for rapid prototyping
  • 3
    Hybrid mobile
  • 2
    Free

What are some alternatives to Ionic, Onsen UI?

Flutter

Flutter

Flutter is a mobile app SDK to help developers and designers build modern mobile apps for iOS and Android.

React Native

React Native

React Native enables you to build world-class application experiences on native platforms using a consistent developer experience based on JavaScript and React. The focus of React Native is on developer efficiency across all the platforms you care about - learn once, write anywhere. Facebook uses React Native in multiple production apps and will continue investing in React Native.

Xamarin

Xamarin

Xamarin’s Mono-based products enable .NET developers to use their existing code, libraries and tools (including Visual Studio*), as well as skills in .NET and the C# programming language, to create mobile applications for the industry’s most widely-used mobile devices, including Android-based smartphones and tablets, iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch.

NativeScript

NativeScript

NativeScript enables developers to build native apps for iOS, Android and Windows Universal while sharing the application code across the platforms. When building the application UI, developers use our libraries, which abstract the differences between the native platforms.

Apache Cordova

Apache Cordova

Apache Cordova is a set of device APIs that allow a mobile app developer to access native device function such as the camera or accelerometer from JavaScript. Combined with a UI framework such as jQuery Mobile or Dojo Mobile or Sencha Touch, this allows a smartphone app to be developed with just HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.

Framework7

Framework7

It is a free and open source mobile HTML framework to develop hybrid mobile apps or web apps with iOS native look and feel. All you need to make it work is a simple HTML layout and attached framework's CSS and JS files.

Qt

Qt

Qt, a leading cross-platform application and UI framework. With Qt, you can develop applications once and deploy to leading desktop, embedded & mobile targets.

PhoneGap

PhoneGap

PhoneGap is a web platform that exposes native mobile device apis and data to JavaScript. PhoneGap is a distribution of Apache Cordova. PhoneGap allows you to use standard web technologies such as HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript for cross-platform development, avoiding each mobile platforms' native development language. Applications execute within wrappers targeted to each platform, and rely on standards-compliant API bindings to access each device's sensors, data, and network status.

Expo

Expo

It is a framework and a platform for universal React applications. It is a set of tools and services built around React Native and native platforms that help you develop, build, deploy, and quickly iterate on iOS, Android, and web apps.

Vue Native

Vue Native

Vue Native is a mobile framework to build truly native mobile app using Vue.js. Its is designed to connect React Native and Vue.js. Vue Native is a wrapper around React Native APIs, which allows you to use Vue.js and compose rich mobile User Interface.

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