Choosing AWS frontend web and mobile
services
Taking the first step
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Time to read
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14 minutes
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Purpose
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Help determine which AWS services to use when building your web or mobile application.
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Last updated
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June 25, 2024
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Services covered
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Introduction
AWS offers purpose-built tools and services to support frontend development
workflows for native iOS, Android, React Native, and JavaScript developers. You can use
these tools to develop, deploy, test, operate, and monitor your app.
In addition to using these services and tools to develop your app, you can:
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Take advantage of a built-in software development lifecycle
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Host your app globally
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Combine these tools with other AWS services for storage, caching,
authorization, and other components of your app
This decision guide helps you ask the right questions to build your web or mobile app
on AWS. It explores how to articulate your business requirements and guides you
through the architecture and hosting decisions you’ll need to make as you use AWS services
to build your app.
Understand
Modern web and mobile apps require high performance and an engaging user experience. In
addition, you probably have your own set of business requirements that support or extend upon
these common needs. Along the app lifecycle, you develop, deliver, test, and monitor your app,
and engage with end users, as shown in the following image.
AWS offers a variety of services to support each stage of this lifecycle. The following
provides a high-level description of these services. Later, this document guides you through
choosing which services you want to use.
What AWS services can you use to develop your app
frontend?
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AWS Amplify
AWS service service for frontend developers to develop and deploy fullstack applications.
Amplify provides a fully managed CI/CD and hosting service to deploy your frontend,
along with libraries that make it easy to add cloud services to your app for features
such as authentication, real-time data, files, and generative AI.
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AWS AppSync
Fully managed API service that automates the operation and maintenance of
GraphQL backends.
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Amazon API Gateway
AWS service for creating, publishing, maintaining, monitoring, and
securing REST, HTTP, and WebSocket APIs.
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What AWS services can you use to deliver your app
frontend?
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AWS Amplify
Fully managed service for deploying and hosting full stack web applications, with
built-in CI/CD workflows that accelerate your application release cycle. Choose from
flexible deployment options, including custom pipelines, monorepos, or multiple
repos.
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What AWS services can you use to test and monitor your app
frontend?
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AWS Device Farm
App testing service. You can test your web and mobile apps across desktop browsers and
real mobile devices hosted in the AWS Cloud.
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Amazon CloudWatch
AWS service that collects and visualizes logs and metrics from your app hosted in the
AWS Cloud.
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What AWS services can you use to engage with end
users?
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Amazon Pinpoint
AWS service that helps you send push notifications, in-app notifications, emails, text messages,
and voice messages.
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Consider
It's important that you choose the frontend web and mobile services that best meet your
needs. But how do you articulate those needs and then map them to the services that fit? The
following table is designed to help you do just that.
- Business requirements
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To make a great choice about the services you’ll need for your app, you’ll need to
answer a few questions about your business requirements first.
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Why are you building it? Articulate the
business need that you’re trying to meet by creating your app. This informs
your choices about services.
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What capabilities will your app users need? The
answer to this question might be a roadmap, where you have a minimum set of launch
features and then plan for when to add new
capabilities.
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Where will your customers be using this app? If
your users are international, you might need to offer specific features and plan for
associated regulatory considerations.
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When and how will users need to access data from the
app? This will have implications for when and how the data is both
stored and accessed.
These are just a few of the questions that you might ask to articulate your business
requirements. Each answer will help you explore the other criteria involved in your
choice.
- Framework
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Are you developing an app for web or mobile?
Your answer will guide your choices in design
and tooling. In addition, your answers to the business requirements questions
on the previous tab will guide and inform your
decision about which development framework you want to use.
If you are
developing:
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A web app, consider the frontend JavaScript
framework you will be using. Common examples are React, Next.js, Vue, Angular, Astro,
and Svelte.
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A mobile app, your choice of framework will
depend on which mobile operating system you're developing for – including popular choices
such as Android, iOS, or Unity.
Your choice of framework is important, but it’s worth noting that it might actually
not be a choice. In many cases, your business requirements will indicate that you need to
develop for both. For example, if your app is designed to host an online store, you’ll
likely want customers to be able to access it with a mobile app and on the web.
- Hosting strategy
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To keep your app’s asset delivery times quick, you’ll want to
host your static assets
close to your users. Consider using AWS Amplify
Hosting, a fully managed hosting service, powered by Amazon CloudFrontwith hundreds of
points of presence globally, for static and server-side rendered apps.
AWS Amplify Hosting supports:
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Client-side rendered (single-page application), including frameworks such as
React, Angular, and Vue
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Server-side rendered (SSR), including frameworks such as Next, Nuxt, and
Gatsby
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Static site generators (SSGs), including solutions such as Gatsby, Eleventy, Hugo,
VuePress, and Jekyll
- Data querying
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You’ll probably design an application
programming interface (API) to allow users to query data for your app on AWS.
You can use GraphQL or REST. The key differences between these two approaches are:
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GraphQL is an API query language that defines
specifications of how a client application should request data from a remote server.
For frontend development, AWS AppSync supports GraphQL.
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REST enables client applications to exchange data
with a server using HTTP verbs, which is the standard communication protocol of the
internet. For frontend development, AWS Amplify, Amazon API Gateway, and AWS Lambda
together support REST.
GraphQL speeds up application
development by providing a single endpoint to query and update data from
multiple databases, microservices, and APIs. It can improve your performance by making
fewer network requests to query data from the backend and reduces the amount of data sent
to web and mobile clients.
- Client-server communication models
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Another key consideration is
how your client will communicate with your server—and how
quickly. Consider how often your client will request or need data, and how fresh that data
needs to be. You'll likely communicate using one of two common scenarios:
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In real time – If you need real-time or near
real-time communication, such as with a chat app or a dashboard for monitoring IoT
device health, consider using the following communication models:
Keep in mind that these options
require more battery life and memory usage, so they’ll probably increase your cost.
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Not in real time – If it doesn’t significantly
degrade usability for your users to refresh their view manually, or if you need new
data loaded only on application or view entry, consider a simple unidirectional communication model.
Your choice will help guide you when you start looking at the capabilities of each
AWS frontend web and mobile service.
- Database services
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Consider what kind of database best supports your use case.
If you have flexibility in
choosing your database, consider what native integrations exist with AWS services. For
example, both AWS Amplify and AWS AppSync natively support integration with Amazon DynamoDB and Amazon Aurora Serverless. Read Choosing an AWS database service for more information about the database
options that AWS offers.
Your database selection might not be an option. If this is the case, consider how to
connect your existing database to the AWS services for building and deploying your app.
- User profile
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Do you want users to have access to their data when they're
offline? If so, you might want to build offline support for the app and
asynchronous data loading into the app to help users get what they need in near real time.
Amplify
DataStore, for example, provides a persistent on-device storage engine to
support offline access.
Where will your users be located when they use your app?
Consider
where your app users will need to access their data. If you plan to support users globally
or in a specific locale, that information will help you plan your latency and your
required points of presence.
In addition, you might consider adding geospatial data and location functionality to
your app. You can use Amazon Location Service, for example, to add capabilities to your app such as maps, points of
interest, geocoding, routing, geofences, and tracking.
- Development strategy
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When building apps on AWS, you can use a serverless approach or containers approach. Overall, building
serverless-first helps you harness more efficiency in the cloud, while a containers
approach gives you more control. This guide focuses on a serverless development strategy.
Your development strategy might not be initially a choice if it’s already determined
in your business requirements. If you’re planning to use a containers approach, see Containers at AWS for
resources.
Choose
Now that you know the criteria for evaluating your options, you're ready to choose which
AWS frontend web and mobile service or services might be a good fit for your organizational
requirements.
The following table highlights which services are optimized for which circumstances. Use the
table to help determine which services might best fit your organization and use case.
| Lifecycle |
Capabilities |
AWS tools and services |
| Develop |
Develop your Android, iOS, or web app with features such as authentication,
on-device and cloud storage, analytics, AI/ML, IoT, and notifications. Natively
integrate with other AWS services. |
AWS Amplify
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| Use GraphQL APIs, and choose from supported frameworks and protocols. |
AWS AppSync
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| Use REST APIs, and choose from supported frameworks and protocols. |
Amazon API Gateway
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Deliver
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Deliver your app using a git-based workflow. Connect private and public
repositories from GitHub, BitBucket, GitLab, and AWS CodeCommit.
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AWS Amplify Hosting
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| Test and monitor |
Test your app by using automated testing or remote access. |
AWS Device Farm
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| Monitor app health with
traces, metrics, logs, alarms, and other resources. |
Amazon CloudWatch
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Engage
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Engage with customers by designing user journeys and analyzing user behavior.
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Amazon Pinpoint
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Use
maps, points of interest, geocoding, and tracking to target your audience.
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Amazon Location Service
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Use
You should now have a clear understanding of what each AWS front-end web and mobile
service (and the supporting AWS tools and services) does—and which might be right for
you.
To explore how to use and learn more about each of these
services, we have provided a pathway to explore how they work. The
following section provides links to in-depth documentation, hands-on tutorials, and resources to
get you started.
- AWS Amplify
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Getting started with AWS Amplify
Learn how to continuously build, deploy, and host a modern web app.
Get started with the tutorial
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Develop your mobile or web app with Amplify Studio
Develop a "to-do app" that syncs app data to the cloud and take off from there.
Explore the guide
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Build a GraphQL API in the Amplify Dev
Center
Define a GraphQL schema that you can use to provision backend resources,
store data locally, sync to a cloud database, as well as receive updates over a
real-time subscription.
Get started
with the tutorial
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Build an iOS app using a cloud-based
backend
Create a data-driven native iOS app, integrated with a cloud-based backend.
Explore the
workshop
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Dive deep with the AWS Amplify Core
workshop
Build a retail store web application in React using Amplify.
Explore the
workshop
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- AWS AppSync
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Getting started with AWS AppSync
Use the AWS AppSync console to launch a sample event app schema, automatically provision a DynamoDB data source and connect resolvers, write GraphQL queries and mutations, and use the API in a sample app.
Explore the guide
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GraphQL Real-time Race workshop
Build a fully functioning application for a fast-paced sports event called
the GraphQL Real-time Race. Connect the frontend of your application to a
robust, performant cloud-enabled backend that delivers real-time updates.
Explore the workshop
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AWS AppSync immersion day workshop
Manage the service in the AWS Management Console and deploy advanced functionality using
the AWS Cloud Development Kit (AWS CDK).
Explore the workshop
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GraphQL decision guide
Determine if GraphQL
is right for your organization.
Explore the guide
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- Amazon API Gateway
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Getting started with the REST API console
Create a serverless REST API using the API Gateway REST API console.
This exercise takes less than 20 minutes to complete, and is possible within the AWS Free Tier.
Explore the guide
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Build an API Gateway REST API with HTTP
integration
Build an API with HTTP proxy integration or the HTTP custom
integration.
Get started with the tutorial
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Build an API Gateway REST API with Lambda
integration
Build an API with Lambda proxy integration or Lambda non-proxy
integration.
Get started with the tutorial
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- Amazon CloudWatch
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Getting started with Amazon CloudWatch
Use the CloudWatch console to see key metrics from all AWS services,
and focus on specific metrics and alarms.
Explore the guide
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Analyzing log data with CloudWatch Logs Insights
Use CloudWatch Logs Insights to search and analyze your log data.
Query for operational issues, identify potential causes, and validate deployed fixes.
Explore the guide
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Using CloudWatch anomaly detection
Enable anomaly detection that continuously analyzes you app's metrics,
determines baselines, and surfaces anomalies with minimal user intervention.
Explore the guide
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Using Amazon CloudWatch dashboards
Use CloudWatch dashboards to monitor your resources in a single view,
and create customized views of the metrics and alarms for your AWS resources.
Explore the guide
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- AWS Device Farm
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Getting started with AWS Device Farm
Use AWS Device Farm to test a native Android or iOS
app. Create a project, upload an .apk
or .ipa file, run a suite of standard tests, and then view the
results.
Explore the
guide
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AWS Device Farm test devices list
View a list of devices available for testing on AWS Device Farm.
Explore the list
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Access your private network from real mobile devices
using AWS Device Farm
Use the VPC-ENI connectivity feature of AWS Device Farm to connect to a web
application that is hosted in Amazon VPC.
Read the blog
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- Amazon Location Service
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Quick start: Creating a web app
Create a static webpage with a map and the ability to search at a
location.
Get started with the tutorial
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Creating an Android app
Create an Android application with a map and the ability to search at a
location.
Get started with the
tutorial
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Create a Custom Map Style with
Amazon Location Service
Style an existing map using Maputnik to help visualize the changes in
real-time.
Read the
blog
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- Amazon Pinpoint
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Getting started with Amazon Pinpoint
Start sending targeted messages in Amazon Pinpoint, including creating segments
that target certain customers and using analytics dashboards.
Explore the guide
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Using Postman with the Amazon Pinpoint API
Set up and use Postman with Amazon Pinpoint. Postman is a popular tool for testing
APIs in an easy-to-use graphical environment.
Get started
with the tutorial
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Setting up an SMS registration
system
Set up a web form to capture customers' contact information. Amazon Pinpoint then
sends the customer a message asking them to confirm their subscription and opts
them in to receiving your messages.
Get started
with the tutorial
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Explore
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Architecture diagrams
Explore reference architecture diagrams to help you develop, scale, test, and
deploy your front-end and mobile applications.
Explore architecture diagrams
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Whitepapers
Explore whitepapers to help you get started, learn best practices, and understand
your front-end and mobile applications options on AWS.
Explore whitepapers
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AWS Solutions
Explore vetted solutions and architectural guidance for common use cases for
front-end and mobile applications.
Explore solutions
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