Xamarin is an application framework that allows developers to create cross-platform mobile applications using a single shared codebase written in C#. It supports iOS, Android, and Windows platforms, providing tools for managing platform-specific code through abstraction or direct calls into native APIs. Integrating with Visual Studio on Windows and Xamarin Studio (now Visual Studio for Mac) as well as other popular development environments, it offers a comprehensive solution for building mobile apps efficiently and effectively across multiple platforms.
Founded by engineers including Miguel de Icaza and Nat Friedman who created Mono, Xamarin was established in 2011 with the mission of simplifying mobile app development by enabling developers to write code in C# and deploy it across different platforms. By leveraging Xamarin's framework, developers can share a significant portion of their code across iOS, Android, and Windows platforms. This reduces development time and effort while ensuring consistency in user experience via tools for managing platform-specific code either through abstraction or direct native API calls.
Xamarin's main competitors include React Native developed by Facebook which uses JavaScript; Flutter created by Google employing Dart; and Apache Cordova which leverages web technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. However, Xamarin sets itself apart by utilizing C# within the Microsoft ecosystem with tight integration into Visual Studio. This provides familiarity for developers versed in .NET technologies. The ability to share substantial portions of code through a single codebase enhances efficiency while its seamless integration with Microsoft's robust toolset adds further appeal to those developing cross-platform mobile applications aimed at broad audiences while maintaining high productivity levels.