The distance between an app idea and a listing on the Play Store feels bigger than it is. It is five stages, and each one has a clear end. Knowing them makes the whole thing ordinary.
This is how we take an Android app from a rough idea to a live listing, with React Native and Firebase, the same way we built RaktoBondhu, our own blood donation app.
1. Shaping the idea
Before any code, we settle who the app is for and the one thing it has to do well. Most first versions try to do too much and launch late because of it. Cutting back is what gets the app in front of real people, which is the only place useful feedback comes from.
2. Designing the screens
Then the screens, one by one, and the path between them. This is where the app gets its feel, and it is the cheapest place to change your mind. A rethink here costs a drawing; the same rethink after the build costs days.
3. Building it
We build in React Native, so one codebase produces the Android app. Firebase sits behind it for accounts, data and anything that has to update live. You see screens as they are finished rather than at the end.
4. Testing on real devices
Working in theory is not enough. We test on real Android phones, including an old slow one, because that is what most people in Bangladesh are holding. Nothing ships because it ran on a developer's machine.
5. Submitting to the Play Store
Store listing, screenshots, privacy policy, a signed release, then Google's review, which takes a few days and sometimes comes back with questions. The developer account stays in your name, so the app is yours and you can publish updates without us.
We have been through it ourselves
We built RaktoBondhu and put it through every one of these stages, so we know which ones take longer than people expect. That goes into every app we build.
Have an idea you want on the Play Store? Tell us about it.