Android Developers for Hire in 48 Hours

Nowadays, there is an extremely high demand for Android developers, both experienced and entry-level. If you have been looking for talented Android developers for hire to join your team, ExpertRemote can help with that! We can help you assemble a dream team of top level Android developers in just 48 hours. 

Importance of Android Apps for Business 

In recent years, the mobile app development market has been rapidly growing. With the increasing demand for mobile solutions and the emergence of new technologies, more and more businesses invest in mobile app development, and the pandemic has also given the market a significant push. Between Apple and Google’s operational systems, Android mobile users dominate the market with 72.2% of the market share globally.

Top Benefits of Android App Development: Why Hire Android Developers?

Over 2.5 billion people all over the world use Android OS, and this number continues to grow every day. It is also the preferred platform for many companies, big and small, because of its multiple benefits: a huge customer reach, fast deployment, easy integration, fewer security issues, and improved scalability. 

Cost-Efficient Development 

Because there are more Android users in the world, there are more Android apps on the market. The talent pool — if we were to talk about native mobile development, of course — is bigger than the one for iOS. The learning curve for Java which used to be the language of programming for Android is shallower than the process for Objective-C which was a tool for iOS development — that impacted the growth in numbers for Android developers as well (plus, some people already knew Java and wanted to try Google’s way of repurposing it for mobile). All of these factors mean it’s easier and more affordable to find Android coders than those specializing in iOS programming. 

Quick Launch & Monetization

Apart from that, with Android devices ruling over the web traffic and Google Play Market having less strict compliance requirements for publishing apps, it’s easier to start monetizing Android apps, with them having lower costs of installation than iOS applications. These factors are essential for small app developers and publishers, especially those that want to start monetizing via in-app advertising (it’s simpler to approve the ads for Play Market than for App Store). 

Open Source & Accessibility Across Various Devices

Android is an open-source platform, which is one of its main advantages. This means that the source code of the Development Kit is available as per the developer’s request. The Android Open Source Project was started by Google to ensure that Android is available for carriers, OEMs, and developers. Apart from that, Android developers create solutions that have a much better chance of working well on different versions of the OS, after various updates. While iOS users prefer to update both their OS and their devices if they aren’t being supported by Apple anymore, Android users can run with their smartphone & OS versions for years without updating. So, an Android developer would worry less about the necessity to keep up with releases of new hardware. 

In conclusion, it’s fair to say that startups that hire Android developers first have better chances of getting their prototype or product to market faster & in a more cost-effective way. Afterward, of course, it’s still better to create an iOS app, too. 

Essential Skills for Android Developers

Android consultants need to have particular skills, knowledge, and experience to develop successful and competitive Android apps. Let’s discuss what an Android developer should be able to do to help you grow your startup. 

Knowledge of programming languages 

The key requirement for any Android programmer is knowledge of programming languages, mainly Java and/or Kotlin. Java used to be the main language for Android development, but in 2019 Google declared Kotin the preferred technology for Android development. Kotlin-based apps are favored by Play Market policies, too. Kotlin is robust, needs less code than Java, doesn’t have a lot of issues Java programming is associated with, and, in general, is considered the future of Android development. 

Java is still a popular language for Android apps and a valid choice. This is especially true if the app needs to be multiplatform, you already have a Java developer on your team, or you want to build a large, complex solution. 

Experience with Android development tools

An Android developer uses lots of tools for programming. Your candidates must be proficient in those that fit their style and your project the most. Android developers program within IDEs (Android Studio, Eclipse, Intellij), use debugging tools (Android Debug Bridge, Stetho), utilize emulators — in particular, for UI, performance, and accessibility testing (Genymotion), work with testing (Nimble Droid) and security toolkits (LeakCanary). 

Niche projects will require an Android developer to use niche tools: for instance, work with Firebase as a BaaS for Android IoT apps or utilize GameMaker Studio or Unity 3D for game apps.  

APIs & 3rd party libraries 

Professional coders must be able to connect APIs and create them for an app. API as a bridge that connects several apps will help them to provide your app with a payment gateway (Paypal, Stripe), an opportunity to log in via social media, convert currencies, and more. Plus, of course, Android developers must know what 3rd-party libraries to use to streamline development. For instance, the Glide library can help with memory management and optimization, and Dagger can help with dependency injections, a feature that makes apps work faster & lag less. 

Basics of Material Design

Material Design is a design language created in 2014 by Google. The goal was to deliver the same high-quality output — and the same beautiful UI — across all platforms. Material Design’s main idea is to imitate real-world objects in UI elements, animations, and so on — but only to a certain level. The design should not look too realistic, but it should convey the idea of “material.” Good programmers should be able to quickly implement components of material design into the app. 

Skill Hierarchy for Freelance Android Experts

Depending on your budget and requirements for the projects, you can hire Android developers of different levels. Below, we’ll outline abilities one should look for when interviewing Android experts.   

Android Developer Interview Questions

Below, we’ll outline examples of questions you can ask an Android developer of different levels when interviewing them. Note, that, while theoretical questions will give you a good understanding of how well an Android expert can explain complex concepts, it’s vital to tie them into real-life problems and your product or service. 

Junior Android Developer Interview Questions

What database do coders use for Android development?

An open-source serverless database SQLite is the most used. Developers can also utilize lightweight wrapper ORMLite to integrate, like, any other SQL database, Firebase if an Android app is to work with real-time data, Realm, as an alternative to SQL data, and other tools. 

Why are emulators necessary for Android developers? 

Emulators can function & behave like smartphones or other hand-held devices, so an Android developer can test out, edit, and attune their applications in close-to-production environments without having to do that on the real device. 

What is Android Jetpack? 

It’s a set of libraries and tools for building Android applications. For instance, the toolkit offers an API for accessing cameras from different versions of Android OS (CameraX) in the best quality possible and a library (Paging 3.0) that helps establish better resource management for an app. 

Mid-level Android Expert Interview Questions

What is a ThreadPool? 

It’s a term from Java. It is a group of worker threads that wait to be executed. As soon as worker threads become available, they take the tasks from the front of the queue and start running them via ExecutorService. 

How Would You Access Data in a ContentProvider?

I would use the ContentResolver object in the app’s Context to communicate with the provider. Then, the object would communicate with the provider object. It would receive information requests from clients, perform the action that was requested by the client, and provide them with the results. 

What Is AAPT?

It is an Android Asset Packaging Tool. It allows developers to view, create and update archives (ZIP, JAR, APK) and compile resources into binary. AAPT is the base builder for Android apps. 

Senior Android Developer Interview Questions

Outline the Process Android Freelancers would Use to Create Custom Views

To create custom views, the first step would be to extend the View class. Then, you need to define and specify custom attributes, add the View to layout XML, and then override the onDraw method. 

Here are the steps for creating custom views:

1. Create an Android project
2. Create a View class
3. Create attribute resources
4. Add the View to the layout
5. Retrieve the attributes
6. Draw the View
7. Provide get and set methods in View
8. Manipulate the View from the activity

That’s the general way of creating custom Views, but it’s advisable to check with View classes that already exist to maintain consistency across classes. 

What are some disadvantages of Kotlin? 

The answers here may vary, but generally, people say that, unlike Java, Kotlin doesn’t do checked exceptions, non-private fields, primitive types that aren’t classes, etc. Also, Kotlin hides a lot of its logic (setters, hash code, etc.) under the hood, and it’s pretty hard to find bags within it.  

When to use late initialization in Kotlin? 

When it’s necessary to initialize the variable later in the life cycle so it won’t allocate memory; within dependency injections, when the class that’s being injected is initialized in separation from the constructor; for unit tests; and more. 

Things to Keep in Mind When Hiring an Android Developer

There are a few things to keep in mind when hiring Android developers if you want to avoid mistakes and save time. Let’s discuss them.

Sense of Product Design

It is a great idea to hire Android app developers who have experience with product design. It means that they have all the skills necessary for creating products based on users’ needs and your business goals.

Experience in UI & UX and Material Design

It’s important to work with Android developers who have experience in UI and know what great design is. It’s also great to hire experts who can translate the results of UX research into technical solutions. Material Design skills are also highly important because they will allow for building better, more consistent user interfaces.  

Experience with app release on Google Play

Developing an app is a multi-step process, and a good Android programmer knows how to bring it to the release. This includes how to develop under Google Play’s compliance requirements, how to optimize the app for before release, and so on. For optimization, a lot of Android developers use, for instance, a tool called ProGuard to release their apps. It can be used to shrink any Java or Kotlin app and make any app faster by 90%. The best Android developers utilize different tools to optimize their code, reduce the size of applications, and remove any unused classes and methods. 

Experience with cross-platform development tools

Startups often want to cover as many market segments as possible with the reach of their mobile apps. So, while it’s not strictly necessary, it’s nice for an Android developer to have experience with frameworks for cross-platform development like React Native or Flutter, to be able to develop both Android and iOS versions simultaneously.