[snugghash]

I think you're forgetting an important stakeholder here: humanity. We as a unit need to do things in an efficient way so we can save our limited resources for other, more important things.

Developers and their time matters more for the above since they're a smaller, minority population whose services are disproportionately necessary as opposed to users (who are more replaceable).

From purely a self-centered user's point of view, it doesn't matter, and might even be a negative since they don't get Apple's high-touch review. But it's not like Apple cares all that much about the opinions or user experience of the user either. One positive I can think of is more diversity and availability, there are just many more PWAs available. Another is time saved - if a user can start using your PWA in a couple seconds instead of painfully installing the app over a minute, then over a billion users you've saved very significant time.

I would even argue this sort of time saving might cause "natural" selection.

[dmitriid]

> We as a unit need to do things in an efficient way

Then you want native apps, not websites.

[SahAssar]

It's not more efficient to build equivalent functionality for iOS, macOS, android, windows and several linux distros when a web app could solve the actual problem for all of them and allow users to pick different os'es for different devices.

[dmitriid]

> It's not more efficient to build equivalent functionality for

It's significantly more efficient for the end user: fewer resources consumed on a few billion devices vs. a few dozen devs building separate apps.

[SahAssar]

For a basic app, well built for both platforms there should not be much difference. A web app also grants significantly more consumer freedom of choice.

[dmitriid]

> For a basic app, well built for both platforms there should not be much difference.

Ah yes, the elusive unicorn of a "well built basic app"

> web app also grants significantly more consumer freedom of choice.

Literally nothing in this conversation up to this point mentioned consumer freedom and choice.

What about consumer freedom and choice not to approach the heat death of universe through the use of websites-as-apps (on of the most inefficient ways to make apps)?