As an Apple user, you will find plenty of Apps on visiting Apple App Store. Since, many Apps are paid ones, users’ buy and install apps that are visually attractive and appealing. Obviously, it is not a wise thing to do because we have always heard that looks can be deceiving but since there are no demo versions available, as an Apple user a person can only judge an application through the available screenshots.

Well, these screenshots obviously cannot help us in analyzing the usability of the applications. So, the only choice that is left with the users is to judge an app based on the way it looks. If you plan to design an App on your own, you have come to the right place. Today, in this article we will be discussing a few tips to build an iPhone app and a few mistakes that one should not commit while building an iPhone app.

Find your Forte

Before you start working on any sort of wireframe for your iPhone app, it is very important to find your niche. You might like a mobile gaming app but if you think you are not capable enough of designing one, you should not go for it. You can only build a nice app when you are passionate about something. So, find your forte and then go ahead with building your iPhone app. If you are a creative person, you should design something more creative and let the game lover develop iPhone gaming apps.

Having a Flowmap

Now that you are aware of your forte, you should work on having a flow map. There is no point in designing a wireframe or design if you do not have flow map. If you want to build a nice iPhone app, you need to have a proper thought out user flow before you design wireframe. It does not matter how simple your app is, you should still be having a good flow map so that your iPhone application has an easy navigation and the structure makes sense. While you are designing a flow map, make sure that functional keys are designed on the top of the screen and not at the bottom. If you do not have flow map, you will end up confusing your user only.

Importance of Wireframe

After finding your forte and designing a flow map, you need to focus on designing a wireframe. The two main elements of any application is the overall designing i.e., user interface and friendly navigation of application. When you are working on UX design, all you need to do is analyze which features to include. Apart from this, UI is all about designing an attractive layout of the app. These two elements are the most important, critical and they go shoulder to shoulder.

One is bound to go wrong if the other is not designed well. To being with, you should focus more on wireframes than UI. A wireframe precisely means that your entire focus should be on the experience and not the user interface. You can either use an illustrator or simply pen and a paper. A few things that you should focus more on is navigation, view-ability modes etc. Once you are sure of an easy navigation, you can go ahead and design attractive layout.

Financial Back-Up

We all know that designing a simple app can cost you a lot of money. If you are confident about your idea, you must get a financial support. Generating an idea is the easiest things as far as building an app is concerned. You need to focus on getting good developers; designers and finally you would need a nice marketing strategy as well. Building an app is a whole process of generating an idea and then executing it via developers, designers and QA engineers. You cannot launch your app unless you have polished it and for all this you would need funds. So, develop the budget and find someone to finance it.

Importance of tappable Area

While we are discussing a few easy steps towards building an app, this is small but a very important point. Finger sized tap will make your application easy to use. Always keep in mind that people will be tapping and not clicking so tappable area needs to be increased. As per apple’s recommendation, 44×44 px is suitable for tapping area.

If you are a developer yourself, you would know that increasing size for tapping does not mean that your button’s size needs to be increased as well. Tappable area can be expanded anyway however, if you have multiple buttons in the same row, you should make sure that tappable area for all buttons is not overlapping in order to avoid any sort of confusion and frustration on user’s end.

Primary Actions

While designing an app’s screen, you need to make sure that your screen focused on the main goal of your user. As a designer/thinker/developer, you would know the most important areas of your apps so focus on the most important and highlight it. Your app should highlight your primary actions.

Avoid Default Button Styles

Let me be very honest about it, the default style buttons are not very attractive and if you want to use them, you should have a very boring UI of your app. If you want your app to look visually attractive, try designing customized buttons for your app so they can compliment entire layout. Designing a button is not that difficult because you will find plenty of tutorials.

Extra Views can be beneficial

If your app has a lot of information to share, you must add extra views. Apple utilizes the feature of adding extra views a lot. This thing can definitely avoid lots of confusion.

Mistakes to Avoid

Apart from all the tips avoid making following mistakes:

• Design should never dictate functionality.
• Avoid using low resolutions
• Too much usage of animations should be a big No
• Do not use blank screens when app is loading and user is waiting.
• Be original. Avoid copying styles from other platforms

Conclusion

A few tips mentioned above and mistakes to avoid will definitely help you in building an iPhone app easily. If you have any tips, please share them with us.