Turning your website into an Android and iOS app

If your product already works well as a website or web app, building native apps from scratch is often the wrong investment. A well-built wrapper gets you into both stores, gives you push notifications and a home-screen icon, and lets you ship updates through your website. The catch: Apple and Google both reject apps that are "just a website", so the conversion has to add real value. We've published web-to-app projects including LinkedMomin, Bot or Not, Shadow AI Detector, Ava, Psychic Wizard and ResQ Pakistan. Here's how we approach it.

When web-to-app is the right call

It's a good fit if:

• Your site is already mobile-responsive and fast.
• Most of the value is in your web content or web app logic.
• You want push notifications and a store presence without maintaining two native codebases.
• You update the product often and want changes to go live without a store release.

It's a poor fit if your app depends on heavy offline use, complex native hardware, or performance-intensive graphics.

What the stores expect

Apple: guideline 4.2, minimum functionality

Apple rejects apps whose features are no different from a mobile website. To pass, the app needs to feel like an app:

• Native navigation, such as a tab bar or native menus, rather than relying only on the website's hamburger menu.
• Push notifications that are actually useful.
• Device features where they make sense: camera, file upload, sharing, biometrics.
• Smooth handling of loading states, errors and offline mode, with no blank white screens.

Google Play: policy basics

Google is generally less strict about wrappers, but you still need a working app, a privacy policy, an accurate data safety form, and account deletion if users can create accounts.

The features we build into every conversion

1. Native shell with your splash screen and adaptive app icon.
2. Push notifications through Firebase Cloud Messaging, with an admin-friendly way to send them. See the Firebase guide.
3. Deep links, so links to your site open in the app when it's installed.
4. External link handling: payment pages, social links and other domains open correctly, not trapped inside the app.
5. Offline and error screens with a retry button instead of a browser error page.
6. File upload, camera and downloads, which often break in a basic webview if they aren't handled.
7. Pull to refresh and proper back-button behaviour on Android.
8. Native navigation elements such as a bottom tab bar linking to your key sections.

Prepare your website first

The app can only be as good as the site inside it:

• Make sure every page works at phone widths with no horizontal scrolling.
• Hide website elements that make no sense in the app, such as "Download our app" banners and duplicate footers, using a user-agent check or a query parameter.
• Check login sessions persist between app launches.
• Speed up the heaviest pages. A slow site feels even slower in an app.

Accounts, payments and in-app purchase rules

If you sell digital content or subscriptions that are used inside the app, Apple and Google generally require their own in-app purchase systems. Physical goods and real-world services are different. Check the current store payment rules before you submit, because this is a common rejection reason for web apps that sell memberships.

If users can create accounts, the app needs a way to delete the account from within the app. Your website may already have this. Make sure it's easy to reach.

Store listing and review

Treat the store listing as seriously as a native app's: real screenshots of the app (not the desktop site), a clear description of what the app does, and a support URL. In the App Store review notes, explain the native features, and give reviewers a demo login if the app requires one. Our publishing guide lists the other common rejection reasons.

Updates and maintenance

Most changes to your app happen on your website and appear instantly. You'll still need occasional store updates for:

• New native features or permissions.
• Android target API level requirements and iOS SDK updates.
• Push and SDK library updates.

Analytics and attribution

Add analytics so you can tell app users from web visitors. Firebase Analytics in the native shell, or a user-agent marker your web analytics can filter on, lets you see how many people use the app, which screens they visit, and whether push campaigns bring them back. If you run app install ads, set up install attribution before spending, or you won't know which campaigns work.

How we help

We build the Android and iOS apps from your existing site, add the native features above, and publish them under your developer accounts, handling rejections and resubmissions until approved. See the live apps in our web-to-app section.