What separates great Android developers from average Android developers? Skill.
If you hire an Android developer with the essential skills, your app will turn out to be good-looking, well-performing, and secure.
The result?
Your app will become a user favorite.
And your business bottom lines will see a boost.
However, if you cut slack while hiring and onboard someone who isn’t good at the job, you’d lose time, money, and your face in front of your business audience.
That makes it important to dive deep into the art and science of hiring an Android app developer.To aid you in that, why we boiled down expert insights and proven best practices. And we created a list of 7 essential skills to look for when hiring Android developers.
To check out the skills, jump straight to this section.
If you have questions about why use a guide or why use this guide, read on.
Table of Contents
Why do I need a guide for hiring an Android developer?
- Data from 2020 suggests there were over 5.9 million Android app developers in the world. Today the number would have certainly increased.
So finding options isn’t a concern. Skimming through the options and finding the right Android developer for your needs is.
- Android app development requires a deep understanding of technologies, platforms, and the market. That understanding is not commonplace.
- In the first quarter of 2021, there were 3.48 million Android apps available on the Google Play Store. Want to make your place in that ocean with your business Android app? You need the right experts backing you up.
- Even getting a simple Android app developed is likely to set you lighter by an average of $50,000. You won’t want to waste so much money by hiring the wrong candidates.
Why should I trust this guide?
This isn’t the first such guide on the Internet. It isn’t the last one either. So why should you trust this guide? Because:
- We aren’t recommending Android app developers in this guide. So we aren’t getting commissions or being biased. This is honest work.
- This guide doesn’t include copy-pasted tips from other search results. Instead, it summarizes the key points highlighted by actual technical recruiters. These recruiters have hired Android developers who yielded better-than-expected results.
- This guide is crisp and brief and can be read in under 10 minutes. It won’t waste your time and you’ll get the information you actually need.
Important Mobile App Developer Skills
7 things that separate great Android developers from average Android developers:
1. Knowledge of Android foundation
Java and Kotlin are the key programming languages used for Android app development. The Android app developer you hire should be fluent in one or both of these languages.
An Android developer needs to understand the basics, syntax, framework, and functioning of these languages.
Without that, they’d just be copying blocks of code from StackOverflow and GitHub. The result would be an app that’s mismatched piecework.
2. Basics about app security
Your business mobile would definitely collect some data from the users, right?
That data needs to collect in a data privacy policy-complaint manner.
It needs to be stored in secure databases.
Also, access to sensitive data has to be limited and safeguarded.
Do you also accept payments from your Android app? Then you’d need to ensure the security of the financial transactions too.
Now Android has a wide array of in-built features that take care of all that.
But making use of Android’s security features and offering your end-users and your business greater privacy and security also requires skills. Thus, Android developers need to have basic security skills too.
3. Working knowledge of UI/UX design
95% of first impressions are design-based.
Your mobile app isn’t going to be any different.
You might not need the prettiest-looking Android application. But it certainly needs to be easy on the eyes. The better the user interface and the more engaging the user experience, the better it is.
To ensure good app UI and UX, the Android app developer should have a working knowledge of these concepts.
But I have UI/UX designers for that job!
Still, to be able to implement the designs created by Android UI/UX designers, app developers need to be acquainted with design basics.
4. Android testing skills
Do you want to launch an app that has more bugs than it has features?
Do you want your quality analyst or application tester to be at loggerheads with the Android developer?
Do you want your app development process and the final app to be a disaster?
To avoid all that, it is essential to hire developers with some testing skills.
- For one, an Android app developer who is well-versed with common manual and automated testing techniques will develop apps much more likely to pass those tests.
- Two, they’d also understand the test results and the QA’s recommendations better.
So the key to a big-free app is an Android app developer with Android testing skills.
5. Fluency with version control tools
When an Android app is being developed there are thousands of features that it can have. And it is nice to be able to try out some features and see if they work well or not.
But what if you add a feature that messes up with your existing Android app MVP? A version control tool like Git, for example, helps avoid such situations. You can restore previous working versions of your app’s code using Git version control. An Android app developer’s fluency in such tools lets you (and them) experiment with features, risk-free.
6. Understanding of APIs
An API (Application Programming Interface) lets two apps or software solutions talk/interact with each other. And it often happens that you want your business mobile app to work hand-in-hand with another app or software.
For example, if you want to let your users sign-up using Facebook, you’d need to use the Facebook API.
Thus, to make sure your app interacts and integrates with others apps, your mobile app developer needs to understand the concept and implementation of APIs.
7. Expertise in managing databases
Data is an important business asset.
And handling data is an important task that your Android app should be able to do.
That’s possible with the use of reliable databases. Basic (SQLite) or extensive options (Firebase) can be used depending on the need.
So an ideal Android app developer should know what databases do and how to use them. They should also be to guide you in choosing the most suitable Android database.
Hiring an Android app developer with all these skills
Did you know the global smartphone market was valued at $507 billion in 2021?
And Android has dominated this market ever since.
With a close to 70% share in 2022, it is likely to continue its high run.
So getting an Android app developed is a great call from a business viewpoint. But to get a competitive business Android app developed, you need a worthy Android developer.
According to Indeed, 40% of applicants lie on their resumes. So if you were planning to scan through candidate resumes to look for these 7 essential skills and base your hiring decision on that, ditch the plan already.
To find a dedicated Android app developer with all the necessary skills, you need to:
- Conduct technical tests and interviews
- Perform rigorous background screening
- Seek and check references
- Explore their portfolios
- Carry out aptitude and attitude tests
That’s the traditional way.
The modern (read: simpler and faster) way is to find a mobile app development company that offers end-to-end solutions without the hassles of hiring.
Or you can consult talent-connect platforms that offer pre-vetted talent for you to choose from.
No matter whether you go DIY for hiring an Android app developer or pick one of the modern methods, make sure you find someone with the right skills. Only then your app will be able to make ripples in the ocean of Android apps.