PWA in Magento 2.3

Hire magento developer for PWA in PWA in Magento 2.3

Digital commerce is being influenced a lot these days by mobiles and this has increased the expectations of customers these days. The tech-savvy customers demand browsing experiences that are light, fast, and similar to that provided by apps. To meet these demands, there have been numerous technologies developed that redefine the user’s mobile experience and provide maximum customer satisfaction. In the world of IT, the buzzword that is topping the lists is Progressive Web Applications or PWA. This form of web technology is gaining a lot of momentum and is organised in a manner to revamp the way business is being conducted by consumers and merchants across mobile devices. This article throws light on Progressive web apps, Magento 2.3 PWA studio’s core features and the reason why PWA should be a part of the Magento 2 app development of e-commerce businesses. Also, once you are aware of the benefits, you must hire Hire magento developer to reap in all the benefits it offers.

Overview – Progressive Web Application Technology

Progressive Web Application or PWA) was introduced in the year 2015 by Google. It is a hybrid between a mobile app and regular web pages. This latest application model merges the features provided by most of the modern browsers with the advantages of a mobile experience.

PWA – What has led to its development?

  • Firstly, regarding the rate of engagement, just 13% is reported by the mobile web and 87% is reported by the native apps. Although mobile web provides a lot of traffic, it has become a tough task of re-engaging the users. When we talk of apps, the rate of engagement is quite high but overall, the user traffic is pretty less. This led to the need to exploit the mobile web reach which in turn led to the progress of PWA.
  • Secondly, regarding the reach, in contrast to mobile apps, mobile web performs way better. The Chrome browser has about 1 million users on a monthly basis on the mobile devices alone. Irrespective of the low engagement rate, people now prefer mobile browsers for accessing the internet.
  • Thirdly, when we talk about mobile apps, a report by Comscore stated that in a specific month in the US, almost zero apps had been downloaded, which indicates the importance placed on apps by the users. Another report stated that mobile users spend about 87% of their time on native apps whereas users spend 80% of their time on just the top 3 apps that they have downloaded on their gadgets.

This is exactly where the progressive web applications play their part.

Progressive Web App technology has been positioned to transform mobile shopping into a very engaging and fast experience. Some of the top companies such as Pinterest, Forbes, Starbucks, Instagram, Tinder, Uber, Twitter, West Elm, and the Washington Post have released PWAs. According to statistics, Treebo, a hotel chain, has benefitted by launching a PWA for their hotel business and they saw an increase in their rate of conversion by 4 times year-over-year.

Implementing PWA can help customers to re-visit your website by offering features like rich offline experiences, push notifications, & periodic background syncs.

Progressive Web Apps & Magento 2.3 – The Integration

In the year 2018, Magento Commerce had announced the launch of Magento PWA Studio that consisted of a collection of tools which would assist merchants in building online stores having the app-like experience. In November 2018, Magento 2.3, the latest version of Magento was released. This version was packed with many exciting features like:

  1. Multi-Source Inventory or MSI: This feature empowers the store owners of Magento to manage all their stocks and inventory directly through the Admin panel despite the various locations. It assists the store managers in managing their inventory without the need to install any other third-party platform. It also permits merchants to reserve inventory for checkouts that are high-performing. It gets rid of re-indexing issues at the time of peak orders. It has a better process of import/export that accelerates the integration with the external ERP system.
  2. Improved Security: Magento has also added additional security features like the Two-Factor Authentication or 2FA and Google ReCaptcha, so as to minimise the possibilities of hacking of passwords and bot-attacks.
  3. Asynchronous API: This assists users in making swift requests without having to wait for a response from the server.
  4. Page Builder: This feature makes it very simple and easy for the store merchants to develop and review their content and distribute them across various third-party platforms, thereby leveraging the APIs and the intuitive interface.
  5. Streamlined Payments: This feature helps the store merchants to streamline their processes of payments and risk management by integrating Signifyd, PayPal, and Braintree. Payment balances can be made more transparent by the store owners. They can also synchronize the details related to the order and payment at the backend of Magento, and ready a report related to the details of the transaction.
  6. Cache Management ACL: The latest version of Magenta – Magento 2.3 will extend and enhance the list of Access Control pertaining to the cache system. This in turn empowers store merchants to control as well as dictate actions related to the cache.
  7. Declarative DB Schema Approach: Under this approach, there is a conversion of XML Schema files into SQL statements. This approach also allows the changes in the database that have been implemented on functionality to be rolled back to the previous version that simplifies the installation process and updation process of Magento.
  8. PHP 7.2 Support: This is the latest PHP version which is part of Magento 2.3. It provides enhanced performance and security.
  9. WYSIWYG Upgrade: There has been an upgrade in TinyMCE from version 3 to version 4. Widgets, Media gallery, and other variables can now be defined for a website or even globally and can be easily implemented as plugins.
  10. ElasticSearch Upgrade: This upgrade enables merchants to merge the strong capabilities of search engines with their e-stores. Elasticsearch v5 is supported by Magento 2.3.
  11. Magento 2.3 PWA Studio: Now, this is amongst the very impressive updates which is included in the Magento 2.3 version. By the use of PWAs, business owners of Magento can own a website that has the features of any native application and they can be accessed easily without installing it or downloading it. The objective behind such PWA inclusion is to enable UX developers and merchants to provide their customers an experience that is innovative, engaging and reliable which in turn gets them a higher conversion rate and better sales.

Magento 2.3 PWA Studio: Key Features

Before you move on to hire the services of Magento 2 developers for integrating the Magento 2.3 PWA studio within your e-store, take a look at its core features:

  • It offers unique tools that help personalize the content and also help in adding local preferences.
  • It offers developer tools that are required for fast prototyping, rich feedback, helpful debugging, and increase in productivity.
  • It provides users an intuitive experience in addition to CMS theming as well as innovative commerce.
  • The channels as well as user experiences can be created and handled through a single code base, a single deployment, and just one app.
  • It enables the user to drive opportunities for the extension resellers with its modularized component structure.

Important Reasons why Magento 2.3 PWA should be used for an e-commerce business

M-commerce has been successful in improving online sales, those using Magento have opted to add many advanced trends such as progressive web application (PWAs) to their platform.

The native apps have been providing a seamless user experience, however, customers find it quite irritating to install apps that occupy a lot of device space. In contrast to the native apps, PWA can be deployed quickly and there is no need to go through any lengthy approval process.

PWA is gaining a lot of popularity because it totally replaces the native app solutions which work well on a mobile browser. When the app is added by selecting the prompt which appears post some few seconds, there is an option of adding it to the home screen of your mobile browser. On launching the app in the mobile browser, the UI controls of the browser can be hidden and will look like a native app. The PWA offer reliable performance which is on the same level offered by that of native app solutions. It also offers fast-loading capabilities that make sure the visitor gets an amazing experience when they browse through your web application.

With Magento 2.3 including the PWA, retailers can easily handle similar situations and assist store owners in overcoming many challenges they face in their e-stores. So, let us now look into the main reasons why Magento PWA should be opted by merchants for their e-commerce business:

  1. Fast Browsing: The Progressive web application enables the stores of Magento 2 to allow their customers to have a fast interaction with the store. This leads to a significant increase in the rate of conversion, thereby increasing the sales.
  2. Compatible with Cross-platforms: PWAs function swiftly on most of the mobile platforms that are being widely used inclusive of browsers like Chrome, Safari, Edge, and Firefox. PWAs have just one web code base which is sufficient to run across numerous platforms, inclusive of desktops. This gets rid of the need to construct and maintain applications across various platforms. Also, the PWA updates can be delivered in real-time similar to that of a website.
  3. Immediate “App” Gratification: PWAs can be discovered and used through the browser immediately, thereby eliminating the need of installing or downloading the app before it is to be used.
  4. Push notifications: These are crucial messages that are sent across as notifications to ensure your customers are well-informed and updated regarding the current deals, offers, and updates. They provide contextual and customised communication in real-time. These notifications also increase the customer engagement by88% or more.
  5. Swift Re-Engagement: PWA integrated into Magento 2.3 enables users to get repeat access and they need not access the browser and they do not have to type the URL. The green also has exceptional navigation tools at the bottom that gives it the appearance and feel of an app.
  6. A Responsive design: It gives store owners of Magento 2 a very smooth and seamless experience across various devices, thereby enhancing customer experience. According to Google, those websites that have a very responsive web design rank much better in the search results of Google. Hence, by using PWA, you can improve the search ranking of your website in Google.
  7. Offline support: Besides all the amazing online features offered, PWA also offers great offline support to the store owners. For example, by implementing the PWA, customers can browse through various products of the e-commerce website. Customers can also add products to their cart without the need for Internet connectivity. But, it is vital that the customer must have visited that specific page previously. If they have, then the customers can place offline orders, and once they get Internet connectivity, the order gets processed.
  8. SEO-friendly: PWAs are very engaging and very reliable. This will definitely increase the chance of any visitor staying for a longer time on your website. Moreover, according to the other announcement made by Google, where it has stated that the websites mobile version will be indexed first, then it is a necessity that all Magento e-commerce owners should have their mobile-friendly version which would perform exceptionally in the search rankings.
  9. Home screen installation option: The PWA integrated into the Magneto 2.3, is similar to the native app icon and you can add this icon to the home screen of the smartphone. This feature enables users to access the website directly by just clicking the icon. So, the user need not access the browser in order to access the website, which enhances the time spent by a user on that application. Eventually this leads to an increase in the conversion rate.

Hire magento developer to get all these benefits mentioned above.

Should you opt for the Magento 2.3 PWA Studio?

PWA Studio provides a great user experience that resembles the experience of an app and thereby improves the SEO, increases the conversion rate and also improves the performance of the website by about 50%. The PWA Studio helps merchants in saving a lot of money, time, and expenses.

The Magento 2 PWA Studio has these below mentioned modern tools:

  • PWA-builderpack: This consists of the vital tools required to create a Magento PWA.
  • Peregrine: This provides UI components required to design a Magento PWA.
  • Venia Storefront: This tool enables creation of a Magento storefront by using the PWA Studio tools.

Besides these tools, Magento 2.3 PWA Studio has many powerful libraries which it offers to its developers:

  • React
  • Webpack
  • GraphQL
  • Redux

Conclusion

PWA has taken eCommerce to a completely new level. It provides a lot of unprecedented opportunities to the e-commerce merchants and store owners. PWA integration in Magento 2.3 has given the e-commerce giants a great eCommerce. If setting up the Magento 2 website is on your mind, and or you need to migrate to the latest Magento version, get in touch with us and avail our services!