Capacitor vs Despia: wrap your web app yourself, or pay a service to do it

1. Is there a developer on the team who will own the native projects? Capacitor gives you an Xcode project and an Android Studio project and expects someone to open them. Despia is built for teams where nobody will.

2. How often will the web app change after launch? Despia advertises “Realtime App Updates”; in its blog’s words, “a UI or logic change goes live without an App Store resubmission.” With Capacitor on its own, each change is a new build: rebuild the web app, sync, build in Xcode and Android Studio, submit.

3. Is the website the product, or is the mobile app the product? Both wrappers are the right answer when the website is the product and the stores are a distribution channel. If the mobile app is the product, read the third option below before choosing either.

Both produce an iOS and an Android app from one web codebase, both run that code in the platform’s WebView, and both are held to the same App Store bar. The table has the differences; the two sections after it have the detail.

What it is, in its own words: “A cross-platform native runtime that makes it easy to build performant mobile applications that run natively on iOS, Android, and more using modern web tooling.” And: “If it works in the browser, it probably works in a mobile app when using Capacitor.” It is open source under the MIT licence, maintained by the Ionic team.

How it works: your project needs a package.json, a directory of built web assets and an index.html. You run npx cap add ios and npx cap add android, which create the native projects, and npx cap sync, which, in the docs’ words, “will copy over your already built web bundle to both your Android and iOS projects”. Then: “open your target platform’s IDE: Xcode for iOS or Android Studio for Android, for compiling your native app.” Building for iOS means a Mac with Xcode.

Native features: through plugins — “a Plugin API for Swift on iOS, Java on Android, and JavaScript for the web.” Official and community plugins cover camera, push notifications, filesystem, haptics and more; anything else is a plugin you write in Swift and Java.

Updates: each change to the web app is a new store build unless you add a live-update service; Ionic lists commercial products (Appflow, Portals) alongside the open-source runtime.

What you keep: everything. The native projects are in your repository from the first command, and nothing depends on a vendor.

What you accept: the setup, the signing, the plugin wiring and every submission are your work or your developer’s.

What it is, in its own words: “Ship Web Apps as Mobile Apps” — “Build meaningful native mobile apps using any web framework, without starting from scratch.” It is a paid service: the Solo Pack is $249 one-time for an iOS or an Android licence with 200 build minutes; the Hybrid Pack is $498 one-time for both, with 400 build minutes; both list “Full Source Code Export”. A Platform API plan is quoted on request. (Prices as published on despia.com, 2 October 2026.)

How it works: Despia builds the native shell around your web app on its own infrastructure and offers “One-Click Submissions” to the stores. Despia says the conversion takes “under 60 minutes”; we have not timed it.

Native features: through Despia’s JavaScript SDK. The home page lists over 25 native features, among them camera, push notifications, in-app purchases and offline support; Despia’s Lovable page says “50+ native features”. Both numbers are Despia’s.

Updates: “Realtime App Updates” — from Despia’s blog, “Web content updates ship over the air through remote hydration, so a UI or logic change goes live without an App Store resubmission.”

What you keep: “you can export full Xcode and Android Studio projects at any time”, per Despia’s blog, and the plans list full source code export. What those projects contain beyond the shell is not stated on the pages we read.

What you accept: a vendor in the build and update path, and the same WebView architecture as Capacitor.

Neither route changes what Apple reviews. Guideline 4.2, verbatim: “Your app should include features, content, and UI that elevate it beyond a repackaged website. If your app is not particularly useful, unique, or ‘app-like,’ it doesn’t belong on the App Store.” It is a bar, not a ban: wrapped apps pass review every day when they use the phone for something the website does not do, such as notifications that open the right screen, the camera, offline use or purchases. Guideline 2.5.6 also means the WebView on iOS is WebKit in both cases. Turn a website into an app covers the guideline in full.

The second thing both share is the layout: navigation, sheets, gestures and new device layouts such as the iPhone Duo’s inner screen are whatever the web app implements. Neither wrapper adds them.

If the answer to question 3 was “the mobile app is the product”, the choice is not between two wrappers. The third route keeps the backend, the users and the auth your web app already has and rebuilds the screens natively: SwiftUI on iPhone, Jetpack Compose on Android. Platform navigation, widgets, Live Activities, the newest device layouts and the 4.2 question come with the platform instead of being added to a web page.

Modaal is our version of this route: your own AI agent, on the Claude, Cursor or Codex subscription you already pay for, builds each feature once and renders it in SwiftUI and Jetpack Compose from one project, with the Xcode and Android Studio projects on your disk. An import that reads a web app’s repository and writes the plan is rolling out to early-access users in October 2026; web app to native has the details and the list. For the three routes side by side, see convert a web app to a mobile app; for a Lovable app specifically, Lovable + Despia vs a native rebuild.

You have a developer, the website is the product, and you want no vendor: Capacitor.

Nobody on the team will open Xcode, and the web app changes every week: Despia, for the over-the-air updates and the submissions.

You want to try the stores once before committing: either; Capacitor costs only time, Despia costs a one-time fee. The Apple Developer Program ($99 a year) and Google Play Console ($25 once) are the same on both.

The mobile app is the product, and you expect to need what a web page cannot do on a phone: neither wrapper; rebuild natively on the same backend.