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Most founders think building a mobile app means starting from scratch.
A new team, new budget, long timeline.
But if your product already runs on Ruby on Rails, you might be just weeks away from having native iOS and Android apps in users’ hands. That’s exactly what we proved after Rails World 2024.
We wanted to show just how easy it can be to migrate a Ruby on Rails app into a fully-fledged native mobile application for both iOS and Android, without the need to rewrite everything from scratch. So we put this idea to the test, evolving the open-source Rails World app we launched last year into the official app for Tropical on Rails 2025.
This journey culminated in the app becoming the official app for Tropical on Rails 2025 in São Paulo, Brazil, where I also had the chance to share our experience as a speaker.
Why migrate to native apps?
The PWA worked well, but a native app brings features PWA’s can’t match: smoother navigation, and deeper integration with iOS and Android. For founders, that means higher engagement and retention without doubling your development budget.
With Hotwire Native, we didn’t have to start from scratch; instead, we leveraged all the logic, views, and work we’d already built for the web version.
How the process went: We went from PWA to native in weeks, not months, reusing 80% of our existing web code. Even without prior native development experience, we had functional iOS and Android apps with minimal new code. For a founder, that’s the difference between shipping this quarter or pushing it into next year. The simplicity of integrating these languages, without needing to build custom native components, made the process straightforward.
A key resource that significantly accelerated our journey was Joe Masilotti's book, "Hotwire Native for Rails Developers," which we highly recommend to anyone considering this migration.
At Tropical on Rails 2025 in São Paulo, the native app became the official event app, earning 300+ active users in just two days. For a founder, that’s a real-world proof point: faster adoption, smoother onboarding, and no rebuild required.
In my talk at the event, titled "Hotwire Native: The Great Mobile Hack," I shared a practical guide showing how we went from knowing nothing about native development to successfully launching an iOS app using Hotwire Native. You can watch the full talk here: Hotwire Native: The Great Mobile Hack. The presentation demonstrated the value of this approach for Rails teams looking to extend into mobile platforms.
The project remains open-source, reflecting our commitment to share what we’ve learned with the community. As part of that effort, I’m also preparing two new blog posts with step-by-step guides for building the native app from scratch for iOS and Android, so anyone can replicate the process easily.
Want to use this app for your event?
This app is available for anyone to reuse, customize, or adapt for their own event or community. If you’re a founder with a Rails app, you might be closer to a native launch than you think. We’ve already helped teams make the jump in weeks, without blowing up timelines or budgets. If you want your users on iOS and Android sooner, let’s talk.
Links to the repository and resources:
- GitHub Repository:
Have questions, suggestions, or want to contribute? You can open issues or submit PRs on the repository, or contact us directly at hi@teloslabs.co!
