Features of Flutter

1. Hot Reload

This feature is one of the best features of flutter. It gives an upper edge to flutter users. In this feature, one can instantly check the code changes without shutting down the whole application and starting it all over again. The developer can add new features in the application code, and the changes are reflected in the output almost instantly with the help of Hot reload. This feature can come in handy for developers because, with significantly less time, he/she can experiment various features. With this feature, the developer can save time and work efficiently.

2.   Cross-Platform Development

This impressive feature is another reason why flutter users have superiority over other applications developing software kits. One code-base for multiple platforms. This saves a great deal of time as a single code can be reused for various platforms. Flutter provides us a large variety of platforms such as Android, Google Fuchsia, Web, Linux, MacOS, and Microsoft Windows. Cross-platform applications are also very quickly updated. Since cross-platform applications are accessed from the internet, updates are not needed to be downloaded one by one. The applications are usually updated on their own.

3.   Widgets

Widgets are an essential part of flutter. Widgets basically are a part of the language flutter heavily relies on- Dart. Widgets can safely be called the core building block with which developers can compose a rich user interface in flutter.

Every widget is a dart object; in flutter, everything is about the widget. The combination of the nested widget is called the "widget tree."

There are mainly two types of widgets:

1. Stateless widget: they have an immutable state. In simpler words, stateless widgets cannot change their state during the runtime. 
2. Stateful widget: they have a mutable state. That means the state is not fixed, and it can be changed multiple times. 

4.   Fast Performance

Flutter is known for its fast and powerful performance. This is one of the features of why developers are now attracted to flutter for creating high performant applications for different platforms. Flutter ensures smooth performance of the applications made using it for IOS, android, windows, macOS and web.

5.   Open-source

Flutter is entirely open-source and 100% free. Dart is also open source and provides extensive documentation and community support. This means that if the developer has any doubt, he/she can clear it with the help of fellow developers working on flutter and dart.

6.   Easy to Learn

Flutter is considered very easy to learn because of the language it uses. Dart is regarded as one of the easiest programming languages to learn. In a short time, one can master dart. Dart is an object-oriented, class-based, and garbage collecting language which makes it modern also. Moreover, there is broad community support for clearing any doubts.

7.   High Productivity

Flutter applications basically use dart language, which is easy to learn. But most importantly, dart language can produce one code-base for mobile as well as web and desktop applications. In short, while creating code, the developer is making an application for all these platforms.

8.   Compatibility

The compatibility of flutter with multiple operating systems is outstanding. The application created using flutter is impressive in terms of compatibility, and no developer has ever had any problems regarding this very topic. For every type of operating system, the application built on flutter works just fine. This is a significant advantage because, this way, developers do not have to spend a lot of time on debugging and hence flutter becomes more productive also.

9.   Google Firebase Support

Google Firebase is a google application development software that helps the developer to create android, iOS and web applications. Firebase provides developers some compelling features such as fixing crashes, searching analytics and many others. For flutter, google offers its Google-backed firebase support, which is very reliable and well-founded.

List of applications made using flutter

• Google ads

It is a utility application that basically manages your ad campaigns.

• Xianyu by Alibaba

Xianyu is an e-commerce application. It is made by the world’s largest e-commerce platform- Alibaba.

• Reflect

It is a lifestyle application created entirely on flutter. The UI is magnificent and aesthetic.

• Water maniac

Water maniac is a self-care application. It keeps track of the amount of water drinking.

• SpaceX Go

SpaceX Go is an application for keeping users updated about Tesla. This is not the official application of Tesla.

• Birch Finance

It is a finance-based application that manages the credit card of a user. It also keeps track of all your spendings.

• Coach Yourself

This German-based health and fitness application is also built using flutter. This application is for meditation and personal development.

• Hookle

Hookle is yet another practical application built by flutter. It basically keeps all your social media accounts in one place and manages them.

• SG BusTracker

This application is for maps and navigations. It provides the estimated time of bus arrivals in Singapore.

Disadvantages of Flutter

1. Large Application Size

Usually, the applications made using flutter are massive in size. At least they have 4MB, which is not suitable for mobile phones with less storage space.

2.   No Skilled dart developers

There are very few developers who are incredibly skilled in Dart programming. Although dart is an easy programming language to learn, but since it is not very popular, there are few developers available only.

3.   Lack of libraries and packages

In flutter, we do not get the liberty of adding third-party libraries and packages in our application. Third-party libraries are new to flutter, so a developer does not get a large number of varieties in libraries.

4.   Heavy application problems

One of the most significant drawbacks of using flutter is that we cannot make heavy applications using it. Flutter is not very supportive of heavy applications like E-Commerce apps.

Conclusion

Flutter is recommended by many developers, and it indeed has a huge future ahead of it. Cross-platform application SDKs are not new to the world, but flutter is definitely giving tough competition to others.

However, it depends on the developer what requirements he/she has. So, it is always advisable that evaluate your task and then see which application developing toolkit will give you the best results.