Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Bootstrap VS Xamarin

Compare Bootstrap VS Xamarin and see what are their differences

Bootstrap logo Bootstrap

Simple and flexible HTML, CSS, and JS for popular UI components and interactions

Xamarin logo Xamarin

Create iOS, Android and Mac apps in C#
  • Bootstrap Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-04-22
  • Xamarin Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-09-17

Bootstrap features and specs

  • Responsive Design
    Bootstrap's grid system ensures that webpages are responsive and adapt to different screen sizes seamlessly.
  • Pre-designed Components
    Bootstrap comes with a variety of pre-designed components like buttons, forms, modals, and navigation bars that streamline the development process.
  • Cross-browser Compatibility
    Bootstrap ensures that your website will function correctly across different browsers, reducing the time spent on debugging issues related to browser inconsistencies.
  • Extensive Documentation
    The documentation is comprehensive and well-organized, making it easier for developers to understand and implement Bootstrap features quickly.
  • Community Support
    With a large and active community, finding help and resources related to Bootstrap development is relatively easy.
  • Customizable
    Bootstrap allows you to customize the default styles and components using Sass variables, making it adaptable to any project needs.
  • CDN Support
    Bootstrap can be included via Content Delivery Networks (CDN), which can help to speed up the initial load time of your web pages.

Possible disadvantages of Bootstrap

  • Uniform Look
    Websites built with Bootstrap often look similar because many developers use the default styles and components without customization.
  • Overhead
    Including the entire Bootstrap library can add unnecessary weight to your project if you only use a small fraction of its features.
  • Learning Curve
    For beginners, the extensive set of features and classes can be overwhelming and take some time to learn.
  • Dependency on jQuery
    Older versions of Bootstrap heavily rely on jQuery, which can be a disadvantage for projects that aim to minimize dependencies.
  • Specific Structure
    Bootstrap works best when you adhere to its predefined structure and classes, which can limit flexibility for more complex or unique designs.
  • Customization Challenges
    Deep customization can be difficult and time-consuming, especially if you need to override many default styles and behaviors.
  • Performance Issues
    Using a large number of Bootstrap components can lead to performance issues, particularly on lower-end devices.

Xamarin features and specs

  • Cross-Platform Development
    Xamarin allows developers to write code once and deploy it across multiple platforms (iOS, Android, and Windows), which can significantly reduce development time and effort.
  • Native Performance
    Apps built with Xamarin perform as well as native apps because they leverage platform-specific hardware acceleration and compile directly to native ARM assembly code.
  • Shared Codebase
    With Xamarin, developers can use a single codebase for different platforms, making it easier to maintain and update apps across multiple operating systems.
  • Large Ecosystem
    As part of the broader .NET ecosystem, Xamarin benefits from a large collection of libraries, tools, and developer resources provided by Microsoft.
  • Strong Community Support
    Xamarin has a strong developer community and comprehensive documentation, making it easier for developers to find support and resources.
  • Integration with Visual Studio
    Xamarin integrates seamlessly with Visual Studio, providing a robust development environment complete with debugging, profiling, and unit testing tools.

Possible disadvantages of Xamarin

  • App Size
    Xamarin apps tend to have larger file sizes compared to native apps because of the additional overhead of the Mono runtime.
  • Limited Third-Party Library Support
    While Xamarin supports a wide range of libraries, not all third-party libraries and SDKs are compatible, which might require custom bindings or workarounds.
  • Performance Overhead
    Some performance overhead might still exist compared to fully native applications, especially in complex and resource-intensive apps.
  • Learning Curve
    Developers coming from purely native development backgrounds might face a learning curve when adopting Xamarin, particularly in understanding the shared codebase approach and platform-specific nuances.
  • Platform Limitations
    Certain platform-specific features and UI elements might not be fully supported or might require additional custom code to implement.
  • Licensing Costs
    Although Xamarin itself is open source, enterprise-level features or more advanced tools might require a Visual Studio Enterprise subscription, which can be costly.

Bootstrap videos

Is Bootstrap Still Worth It? -- 1 Design, 2 Code Bases.

More videos:

  • Review - BOOTSTRAP Review | Best CSS Library ?
  • Review - Should you use Bootstrap?

Xamarin videos

Pros and Cons of Xamarin Development

More videos:

  • Review - Is Xamarin Forms Any Good?
  • Review - Why Xamarin Is Awesome

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Bootstrap and Xamarin)
Developer Tools
84 84%
16% 16
Design Tools
100 100%
0% 0
Development Tools
64 64%
36% 36
CSS Framework
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Bootstrap and Xamarin

Bootstrap Reviews

22 Best Bootstrap Alternatives & What Each Is Best For
Bootstrap alternatives are a suite of different tools and frameworks that web developers and designers employ for creating dynamic, responsive websites and applications. These tools, like Bootstrap itself, offer pre-written code for different elements of a website - from typography and buttons to navigation bars and image carousels - but each has its unique features and...
Source: thectoclub.com
15 Top Bootstrap Alternatives For Frontend Developers in 2024
UIKit is a modular front-end framework like Bootstrap and a Bootstrap competitor designed to develop fast and powerful web interfaces. You can utilize it with HTML or JavaScript based on your preference. It offers built-in support for right-to-left languages and includes an extensive library of components. This framework like Bootstrap provides a convenient solution for...
Source: coursesity.com
9 Best Bootstrap Alternatives | Best Frontend Frameworks [2024]
The only downside it has as compared to Bootstrap and Foundation is it is only a CSS framework, which means no JavaScript. So you will have to write your own JavaScript or Jquery to toggle your dropdowns or perform other basic interactionhttps://bulma.io/s of the sort. Overall it is a great alternative to Bootstrap, which is also being updated very frequently.
Source: hackr.io
Top 10 Best CSS Frameworks for Front-End Developers in 2022
Bootstrap is one of the most popular CSS frameworks globally and received instant popularity because of its responsive design. It was also the first framework that gave priority to mobile devices. With Bootstrap, there is no need for a separate design for mobile viewing. You just need to add the necessary classes, and the website will adapt to the screen size based on the...
Source: hackr.io
15 Best CSS Frameworks: Professional Bootstrap and Foundation Alternatives
This is why Bootstrap is by far the most popular framework on the market. All developers have heard of Bootstrap, and more than 80% of them say they are happy using it.

Xamarin Reviews

Explore 9 Top Eclipse Alternatives for 2024
Xamarin.Forms An open-source UI framework that enables developers to conjure up applications for Xamarin.iOS, Xamarin.Android, and Windows from a singular shared codebase. Offers rich features like XAML user-interface language, databinding, gestures, effects, styling.
Source: aircada.com
Top 10 Flutter Alternatives for Cross-Platform App Development
Developed and launched by Microsoft, Xamarin facilitates developers to build apps for iOS and Android by using C# and .NET. It ensures a seamless integration with Visual Studio and lets developers experience a fully familiar environment. The framework provides a single codebase and allows developers to perform app development rapidly.
Exploring 15 Powerful Flutter Alternatives
Xamarin is a Microsoft-created framework for building native iOS, Android, and Windows apps in C#/.NET. On the complexity front, Xamarin apps generally require more focus on memory management and garbage collection tuning relative to alternatives like Flutter. The additional diligence pays dividends in runtime performance when done properly. However, developers with...
THE BEST 34 APP DEVELOPMENT SOFTWARE IN 2022 LIST
Xamarin is a Microsoft-owned tool to write native code for apps. Free. Cross-platform. Open-source. An app platform for building Android and iOS apps with .NET and C#.
9 Of The Best Android Studio Alternatives To Try Out
You can also access the required resources at the Xamarin Universal project. You can stay up to date with the latest updates by subscribing to their YouTube channel or blogs. The Xamarin community is most active, and you can get answers to your questions swiftly.

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Bootstrap seems to be a lot more popular than Xamarin. While we know about 362 links to Bootstrap, we've tracked only 28 mentions of Xamarin. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Bootstrap mentions (362)

  • How to Build a Blog with Laravel (& Send Slack Notifications)
    This will show the posts passed from the controller in a row of cards. Please notice that you are linking to Bootstrap’s CDN for easy styling. If there are no posts, a message on a card saying that there are no posts will be shown. - Source: dev.to / 15 days ago
  • Overengineered Anchor Links
    Yeah, good point. It's kinda common to have a big footer. Examples: https://getbootstrap.com/, https://stake.us/ (casino) That way on desktop you could get away with a 50vh margin under the content and then another 50vh for the footer. - Source: Hacker News / about 1 month ago
  • The 3 Best Python Frameworks To Build UIs for AI Apps
    FastHTML allows developers to build modern web applications entirely in Python without touching JavaScript or React. As its name implies, it is quicker to begin with FastHTML. However, it does not have pre-built UI components and styling. Getting the best out of this framework requires the knowledge of HTMX and UI styling using CSS libraries like Tailwind and Bootstrap. - Source: dev.to / about 2 months ago
  • Tailwind CSS vs. Bootstrap: Which Framework is Better for Your Project?
    Bootstrap is one of the oldest and most established CSS frameworks, originally developed by Twitter in 2011. It takes a component-based approach to web development, providing a comprehensive collection of ready-to-use UI elements and prebuilt components. - Source: dev.to / about 2 months ago
  • How I Vibe-Coded an App to Explore GitHub Topics and Trending Repositories
    For the frontend, I had no prior experience, so I relied entirely on Claude's capabilities. 🙏 Claude generated the entire frontend in pure JavaScript, HTML, and CSS, and even added Bootstrap to it. This not only saved me a significant amount of time but also made my application responsive and visually appealing. - Source: dev.to / about 2 months ago
View more

Xamarin mentions (28)

  • Wine Releases Framework Mono 6.14 in Taking over the Mono Project
    I haven't been following .NET lately, but AFAIK .NET works on Linux now and "Mono" is basically .NET for Linux... What even are the differences? Sounds like Microsoft just doesn't want to maintain 2 different versions so they're dumping it. Also, > Microsoft became the steward of the Mono Project when it acquired Xamarin in 2016 They probably never even wanted Mono, they just inherited it because they wanted... - Source: Hacker News / about 2 months ago
  • C# Fundamentals
    Mobile Applications: With Xamarin, a cross-platform mobile development framework, developers can write C# code to build native Android, iOS, and Windows mobile applications. - Source: dev.to / 11 months ago
  • Making an android app with c#
    Xamarin - Basically an older version of MAUI. I would advise against creating new projects on Xamarin since MAUI is supposed to render it obsolete. Source: over 2 years ago
  • App developer
    Microsoft Xamarin: For this you'll need to know C# and .net. Source: over 2 years ago
  • I own a web development company in San Antonio and I'm looking for ideas to support the UTSA students with some sort of free courses or classes
    At my internship, we moved to Microsoft's Visual Studio for C# development from Java, and for application development we use Xamarin which can be used on Windows and Mac. Source: over 2 years ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Bootstrap and Xamarin, you can also consider the following products

Tailwind CSS - A utility-first CSS framework for rapidly building custom user interfaces.

Android Studio - Android development environment based on IntelliJ IDEA

Materialize CSS - A modern responsive front-end framework based on Material Design

OutSystems - Build Enterprise-Grade Apps Fast.

Bulma - Bulma is an open source CSS framework based on Flexbox and built with Sass. It's 100% responsive, fully modular, and available for free.

Xcode - Xcode is Apple’s powerful integrated development environment for creating great apps for Mac, iPhone, and iPad. Xcode 4 includes the Xcode IDE, instruments, iOS Simulator, and the latest Mac OS X and iOS SDKs.