Magento PWA Studio – The Whys & Wows of Magento PWA [2024]

Magento is now a progressive web application development platform!

Heard a lot of buzz about progressive web application for Magento in recent times? Me too, and now finally we have the Magento PWA Studio to experience the “revolutionary” mobile and merchant experience!

On January 15, 2019, Magento announced the availability of PWA Studio. And there was no looking back! Developers can now use the set of tools to develop a progressive web app. Being the future of web app development, Magento 2 PWA Studio has features similar to a native mobile application.

You’ll learn about:

• What is PWA
• Why Magento PWA Integration
• What is Magento PWA Studio
• Advantages of Magento PWA Studio for merchants
• Advantages of Magento PWA Studio for users

What is Progressive Web App (PWA)?

PWA, i.e., progressive web application, is one of the most discussed technologies in the web. It is not possible that you are building a website and you haven’t heard about the word “PWA”. Installing web apps on the phone for real is a thing now! 

PWA is the future of web development offering features similar to a native mobile application. PWAs allow accessing the content offline without the need for internet connectivity.

PWA is a web app delivers the app-like experience to the users, it is:

Progressive – as it lazy loads itself!
Web – as it’s developed using the various web languages like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript
App – as it gets installed and runs code on mobile phones

Why Magento PWA Integration?

According to Statista, 39.6% of US E-commerce sale generated from mobile phones which was expected to reach 44.7% till the end of 2019. Looking at the facts of m-commerce driving more online sales, Magento has made a smart decision to integrate PWA with Magento to get benefitted with better user experience and conversions.  

What is Magento PWA Studio?

Back in June 2017, Magento shook hands with Google to integrate the best of PWA features in Magento. With the release of Magento 2.3.0 in November 2018, the PWA Studio for Magento 2 came into action and Magento became one of the first few Ecommerce platforms allowing users to get the best out of PWA with full potential.

Magento PWA studio provides the developers with required tools to create and maintain PWA storefront on the top of Magento 2. 

The Magento PWA Studio comes with: 

• pwa-buildpack – Used to set up and configure a local environment for PWA development, it is a library for Magento PWA.
• peregrine – A set of React components created to handle Magento-specific functionalities like routing, root-components, layout handler, product lists, price display, etc.
• Venia storefront – A demo theme created with the Magento PWA studio. It displays the current features and workflow.

Why should store owners use Magento PWA Studio?

• Cost-effective: Use of web stack for the development makes it cost effective. Eliminate the cost of native apps. Simply upgrade the already built Magento 2 website into a PWA.
• Reach out to mobile users: As per statista, the choice of mobile for online shopping is increasing. With m-commerce in trend, the Magento 2 PWAs can work offline and users can browse through the store, provided they have visited it before! Offer a mobile app like experience for your store with Magento PWA Studio!
  When the user visits your PWA-backed Magento store on a browser, an “Add to Homescreen” popup will appear. Once the user clicks on it, the PWA version of the store is added to the user’s home screen. Now a mobile web user is converted into a mobile app user, allowing you to avail the benefits of m-commerce trend!
• Works Offline: PWA sites cache some website content to serve even if the users are offline.
• Time-Saving: No need to develop a different app for Android and iOS!
• Add to Homescreen Icon: The add to home screen feature of PWA adds the site to the phones home screen that allows users directly visit the website without opening the browser and typing URL. This increase the session time of the users which is the vital factor improving conversions.
• Cross-Platform Compatibility: Using PWA in Magento, a single web code is enough to run on multiple platforms and thus, it can run in any mobile browsers and platforms. Additionally, there is no need to update PWAs from the app store as they are updated in real-time just like a website.
• Responsive Design: According to Google, sites with the responsive design outranks SERP and as PWA provides a consistent experience in any screen be a mobile, tablet or the desktop, implementing it help your sites rank higher in Google search results.
• Boost SEO: As Google announced mobile first index, using PWA significantly improves the mobile version of the website and helps in the mobile-first index. Also, with the improved speed and responsiveness on multichannel, boost the SERPs and hence the traffic using Magento PWA!
• Make the most out of push notifications: With PWA, do not miss out the marketing opportunities that push notifications offer! Keep the customers updated about the discounts, launches, news, etc. 
• Higher Conversion Rate: If you compare the conversion rate of the mobile web and apps, mobile apps are always the front runners. As Magento PWA provides app-like experience with the added advantages of faster loading, low data use, and cross-platform compatibility, you can see your conversions reach for the sky!
• Increase the Number of Users: Users tend to download the apps for their most favorite and popular shopping brands like Amazon and Flipkart. With PWAs, users can single click to add the PWA of a web store in their mobile phones which is as easy as ABC. The amazing one-click download feature drives numerous user downloads. 

How does Magento PWA Studio ease the shopping experience for users?

• Low data use: With the versions of already visited pages stored in the cache, the users can access them without internet connectivity. Hence, save the data on repeated visits.
• Faster loading: Magento PWA Studio offers faster loading as compared to a responsive web store. Hence, users can experience a smooth shopping experience!

That was all about Whys and Wows of Magento PWA. There’s a lot more to this which can be referred here

Download latest Magento 2.x version and start exploring PWA Studio and its potential!

If the post helped you to get a general overview of the topic, rate it with 5 stars! Also, let me know if you can list out more features and benefits. Discussions about the PWA Studio for Magento 2 are welcome in the Comments section below!