I think a large factor is the ever increasing need to have different display sizes for different pixel densities, developers essentially have to create and package a couple versions of the same application into one package and that is alot of waste.

At least in the context of this article (iOS app bloat) this is no longer the case - developers upload all assets for all pixel densities, but Apple repackages for each specific device, so that each device only gets one set of assets. Same goes for binaries for multiple architectures - each device only gets the binary for its specific CPU architecture.

Also to the GP's point - Apple also now no longer supports splash screen images, so that element of bloat is no longer a factor (though some legacy apps have retained them pointlessly).

I think for non-game apps assets are not the primary driver of bloat.

Interesting, thanks for sharing that.

I didnt know this as the only mobile I have dabbled with has been game dev with android in which case assets are the main cause of bloat.

If the application is properly packaged, the appstore should be able to generate configuration-specific variants which only include the assets relevant to your device class (https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/ID...)

This makes sense, a much better way to do things.

The worst part is that they probably use huge PNGs to make sure the flat graphics are clean. You know, the kind that are perfectly suitable for vector graphics.

Flat graphics are actually extremely compressible with PNG's.

That's actually one of the positives from moving away from gradients and shadows everywhere, funnily enough.

They are, but as soon as ther is anything that is not a rectangular gradient with a continuous delta, they're probably still bigger than SVGs

Unless your graphic designer provides you with vector graphics embedding a vector for each pixel of the rasterised image of the original vector graphic.

Sigh...

That's almost as bad as the autogenerated SVG I once was sent that used hundreds of thousands of think horizontal lines to fill an area. Instead of, you know, a filled polygon.

The sheer number of vectors could make any renderer I threw at it crash.

Not for apps like Facebook. Their app binary is in the hundreds of megabytes.