If you are a developer reading this, you would probably agree that the development of effective and portable applications helps you to differentiate yourself from the crowd. However, the time factor is especially crucial in this domain. Therefore, it becomes all the more necessary to take leverage of the tools that are available at hand along with Backend as a Service (BaaS). This will facilitate the completion of app projects, quicker than you could ever imagine. However, it is also very important for the unversed, to first know about the basic difference between Frontend and Backend of a website, and the concept of BaaS.
The frontend is the part of your website that you need to deliver to the client. It is basically the visible part of the website, which the end-user interacts with. It is generally built with the help of languages such as HTML, JavaScript, and CSS. It is also called the client side of the website.
Whereas, the backend is the server-side of the website, that remains hidden from the end-users. However, it plays an equally important role in delivering the best user experience, as navigation is reliant on this part. The APIs and libraries associated with the application or software project form the core of the backend.
Backend-as-a-Service, as the name suggests, is that part of the software application, where you essentially provide support and infrastructural development to build your backend. It is quite possible to take leverage of existing tools, like SDKs, and APIs, to build a scalable backend.
It will eventually help you to save money and time, apart from reducing the hassles of creating your own complex infrastructure. BaaS companies mainly provide support for services such as authentication, file storage, geotagging, and push notifications, amongst others. If you incorporate the best and most functional BaaS, then you don’t have to spend a lot of time on maintenance and repetitive tasks. Instead, you can focus on the customer experience.
The BaaS market has seen rapid growth over the last few years. It is a cloud computing service, where third-party providers offer developers a prefabricated backend infrastructure. It helps one to focus on the frontend. The global BaaS market size was worth $ 2.8 billion in 2022.
Streamlined Development Process
BaaS helps in optimizing the development process as well as the workflow, by offering a ready-to-implement backend structure. It removes the need to start from scratch. This speeds up the development process in more ways than one. Moreover, it also increases the overall productivity.
Adds Scalability
BaaS provides the facility to expand your app, as the user flow increases. It will enable you to keep pace with the business demands. Its presence helps in managing the basic infrastructure apart from meeting the needs for changing traffic. There is no requirement to purchase additional hardware, or worry about the infrastructure, giving your business the much-needed flexibility.
Cost Savings
Deploying and maintaining a proper, profitable BaaS can be very expensive. However, with the utilization of BaaS, you can optimize the costs. It is due to the reason that it helps in bypassing the upfront costs as well as future costs. Many BaaS operators operate under the pay-per-model system, which allows users to scale the app resources, along with rising traffic.
More Focus On Core Areas
If you outsource the backend management to BaaS, your development team can focus on other nitty gritties. This allows the developers to offer a unique value to their customers, while providing a high-end frontend experience.
Deputation Of Complex Operations
The utilization of BaaS helps you to outsource the complex functionalities towards service providers. Infrastructure management, security, and database administration are facilitated by BaaS, which have dedicated resources for the same. It also reduces excessive burden on the team, so that they can focus on strategic decision-making.
Helps With Quick Prototyping
BaaS allows the developers to quickly create prototypes and envision new ideas. A ready-for-use backend infrastructure helps in agile development. It allows the progress in the development, based on user responses. It also promotes an environment of experimentation.
Some of the examples that use Backend as a Service (BaaS) users include:
The use of BaaS helps in reducing server-side code, lessens development time, and also helps in cross-platform operations. However, companies that go for the service must take into account their basic development needs, HTML-5 compatibility, and what backend services they need to access.
This is one of the top BaaS platforms, which comes from Google. Utilizing it, developers can build and ship apps on several OS, like Android, iOS, and web. It has evolved over a decade or more, and now offers a wide range of tools like authentication, hosting, cloud storage, analytics, and cloud functions to name a few. Over 3 million developers use Firebase to reach and engage billions of users.
It is another open-source BaaS platform that is built upon the Parse framework. You can easily access scalable and functionally rich services, like databases, file storage, and push notifications. Thus, allowing developers to develop prototypes very quickly, and develop a wide range of applications, without too many backend infrastructure services.
Amazon Web Services Amplify (BaaS) offers a huge range of backend development web services and mobile app services. The mainstay of such deliverables are feasible due to authentication, storage, APIs, and server less functionalities. Moreover, Amplify integrates well with other AWS services.
Progress Software offers Kinvey as a BaaS platform, which arrives with enterprise-based features, like data integrations, user management, and push notifications. It also offers analytics for complex and data-rich apps. You will also get access to a secure and scalable infrastructure to host complex apps.
It is an open-source Firebase alternative BaaS. And, one of the fastest-growing ones today in the e-Commerce sector. Founded in 2020, Mozilla backs it. Although it does not come with too many features, it offers all the core ones, like authentication and real-time database access. So, developers can ship their apps conveniently.
Another open-source and self-hosted BaaS, it provides REST APIs to handle all the core backend needs of any app. Moreover, it arrives with an agnostic platform that can work on any OS, or with any programming knowledge. You can get easy access to a set of APIs and tools to build apps quickly, than ever. The other functionalities that it offers include user authentication, account management, and storage persistence.
It is one of the leading BaaS platforms today, and was acquired by Facebook’s Meta in 2013. It also became open-source three years down the line. One can deploy it and run it on Node.js and also MongoDB. You can also set up the server locally and start with the development. Most developers deploy it later on, on services like AWS and Heroku. Parse also comes with a huge community and several SDKs, to build apps for all kinds of platforms.
Scalability And Performance
One of the most important criteria for BaaS is the ability of the framework to scale, with rising traffic. As customer databases expand, so does the need for storage space. Apart from space, it is also important that the performance does not degrade. Moreover, the cost of growth must be proportionate to the resources used. This is referred to as linear scalability, which is essential for a viable business model.
Ease Of Integration And Development
The highly distributed nature of BaaS makes it challenging at times. However, a strong and user-friendly admin functionality can help in relieving much of the burden.
The services must allow customers to easily state their policies, and thereby convert them to actual commands, that drive backup functionality and recovery operations. It is also a prerequisite for BaaS to be able to integrate with social media platforms for improved user engagement. It also helps in reaching out to a new set of audience.
Security Features
The best BaaS must have all the data secured, whether incoming or outgoing. The data must be encrypted and the technology must support the encryption. You ought to ensure that the customer accounts are isolated.
Additionally, the data stored in backup copies must be consistent. The copies of the stored data are secured, when the copies are well-distributed across diverse geographical locations. And that is what BaaS facilitates. The data protection service market is also expansive, and was valued at $15.49 billion in 2020, and is projected to reach $170.54 billion by 2030, growing at a CAGR of 27.2%.
Pricing And Flexibility
One can get access to BaaS platforms that range in price from a free one to hundreds of dollars every month. So, one can choose a BaaS according to the budget.
Community And Support
BaaS platforms are third-party services that provide ready-made systems that are well-documented as well. So, developers can access the community whenever they get stuck. As the application uses customer data, code functions, and server configurations, you need these functions to be up and running virtually all the time. The community offers solutions to queries on these. Some even offer redundant infrastructure to keep the apps running at all costs.
If You also need a expert who can build and setup BaaS for your app then you can Hire a Developer for your project.
With the help of Backend-as-a-service, businesses can focus more on strategic areas that include frontend. Outsourcing the backend reduces the development time, and also leads to cost savings. It also allows one to get access to a large number of prefabricated features and APIs.