Back in 2015, Google helped to blur the lines between the web and native apps by allowing developers to prompt users browsing their site to add it to their Home screen so it appears the same way as other apps. Now, with something Google is calling Progressive Apps, the lines have almost disappeared from a user perspective.
The latest update to Chrome will deepen the integration between Android and web applications.
Not only will the saved web apps now appear in the app drawer, but they’ll also be integrated with the system to appear in the settings.Even more exciting, the web apps will be able to receive intents from other apps.
Intents allow the relevant app to carry out a specific function when required by another app, or when a user taps a URL which calls it.
In order to make web apps function as “reliable, fast, and engaging” as native applications, Google is using ‘service workers’ to cache key resources so your app will load faster even if there’s no internet connection available.
