Low-code development—a revolutionary rapid application development approach to create applications, automate business processes, and deploy custom solutions rapidly—is projected to grow at a rapid pace in the upcoming years. This is because of the deep versatility of these platforms, which facilitate rapid digital transformation and enable the hassle-free development of holistic software applications. What's more, all this can be done with limited technical development skills and coding expertise!

App development in low-code platforms  

These platforms offer a visual, drag-and-drop interface to develop complex applications. When compared with conventional app development, they accelerate software development up to ten times faster. Low-code solutions encapsulate the essence of rapid application development.

Plus, contemporary technologies—through innovation—enhance the capability of no-code technology and low code technology to extend their utility vastly, enabling businesses to consolidate their market presence.

Adoption of low-code platforms continues, and these platforms have been overhauling themselves for the better based on continuous feedback over the years. The changes in low-code technologies can be broadly categorized into technical improvements and business enhancements.

Some prominent technology driven 2024 trends in the realm of low-code are:

• AI

• Machine learning

• Blockchain

1. Integrating AI  

In recent years, advances in artificial intelligence (AI) have caused it to permeate many facets of life. Particularly, large language models (LLMs) trained on millions of datasets have transformed the way people work or even approach work across the globe. Type in your desired outcome into a LLM like ChatGPT, and it could even provide you computer code to transform your requirements into reality—applications built using LLM generated code! Software developers' lives have been made much easier thanks to AI technologies.

If you want to create content, all you need to do is provide your query into the LLM's input, and it will generate the content for you. You are free to tweak and modify the content and use it as you see fit.

To capitalize on these advancements unleashed by AI, several low-code platforms in the market today offer an integration with ChatGPT.

The result?  

Supercharged low-code application development and development process. You can develop applications much faster with low-code platforms; now with generative AI models like ChatGPT, you can develop fully-functional applications even faster!

2. Machine learning  

A tributary from the river of AI-induced innovations, machine learning (ML)—training computers to learn from input to obtain the desired output—is all the rage today. Aside from "learning," ML allows digital systems to make decisions and function without prior programming to that effect.

Training means feeding data to computer systems so that they "learn" from it; that is, they gain the ability to make impactful decisions based on the input fed into them. Training enables computers to identify patterns in huge data sets, allowing them to improve with each iteration of data processing and consumption.

You can train computers and computer-like systems (smartphones and tablets) to  :

i) Identify objects and extract their details by training them on pictures of objects

ii) Extract data based on patterns from raw data, extract sentiments, and extract keywords from text

iii) Predict the value of one field based upon other fields

Besides the above capabilities, ML also enables computers to interpret user interactions, gauge the software's performance, and improve it. These interpretations of user interactions allow the software to improve itself after each cycle of execution. ML-powered software allows you to tweak workflows seamlessly, optimize them, streamline them, and extract maximum throughput.

The result?  

Instead of hiring actual humans to do the mundane work, ML-enabled automation saves time and money. A computer can do the work of several humans, often faster and as accurately, sometimes even with higher accuracy.

You get supercharged productivity and output quality. This ensures a win-win scenario for all stakeholders.

3. Blockchain  

Low-code development platforms, low-code development tools, and no-code platforms have slowly started leveraging the technology at the core of Bitcoin and other prominent cryptocurrencies—blockchain technology. This is done with the objective of improving both security and transparency of low-code applications. As a decentralized system, blockchains provide a reliable infrastructure to build secure, efficient, transparent, and scalable low-code applications. This is of great importance in mission-critical and sensitive industries such as healthcare, banking, logistics, and eCommerce, where the security around data systems is critical.

The result?  

Low-code solutions and no-code solutions stand to gain a lot. Blockchain integration throws the door open for low-code and no-code development platforms to enable the development of dependable applications, better than ever before. Multiple industries can focus on developing reliable, sturdy, and robust applications that implement the blockchain technology for their business process automation on top of low-code technology. Low-code development technologies and no-code development tools will have the potential to empower non-technical users and non-IT professionals to implement holistic digital transformation by harnessing blockchain to build resilient applications.

Low-code trends for 2024: The business perspective  

There is also the other spectrum of trends for low code in 2024—the business aspect. Business users stand to gain a lot from these advancements in low code and the advanced capabilities of low code.

1. Greater adoption by large enterprises  

Though it has been around for a couple of decades now, low-code tech has been predominantly leveraged by small and medium-sized enterprises. Large enterprise adoption has not been that huge.

Reasons why large enterprise adoption of low code hasn't been that prolific are:  

i) Legacy technology. Large enterprises are reluctant to leverage low code because they will have to let go of the legacy technologies they currently use. This reluctance will have a negative financial impact. It will also take a lot of time to migrate from legacy platforms to new age low-code applications.

ii) Platform constraints. A few years back, low-code platforms did not provide the full plethora of features like they offer now.

iii) Steep learning curve. Enterprises were hesitant to leverage low-code platforms and no-code platforms earlier because of their then inherent steep learning curve.

The situation today

Enterprises are now readily adopting low code today because of several factors:

i) The ability to integrate legacy technology easily with low-code applications. The platforms have now advanced to an extent that integration with legacy platforms can be achieved in a fraction of the time when compared to the time taken and effort needed a few years back.

ii) More features, less constraints. Low-code platforms and no-code platforms are more flexible now based on the features they offer. Some examples are native mobile application development capability, which is a game-changer.

iii) An easier learning curve than before. Low-code platforms these days are designed to be learned within a short span of time compared to the past. Some low-code platforms, like ManageEngine AppCreator, have a learning curve of just a few hours.

The above three factors are just some of the considerations that make low-code platforms more attractive to large enterprises in 2024 and beyond, when compared to the status quo of a few years back.

2. Citizen developers will create more applications  

Initially, to develop an application, you had to be well-versed in programming languages. Programming languages "speak computer" to computers, and it was also necessary that you were a master of multiple programming languages to build a fully-functional application from scratch. If you were a layman, someone who didn't know about computer science and programming, it was hard for you to develop software to automate your business processes.

Low-code platforms attempt to solve this problem. How do you empower someone who doesn't have the technological prerequisites to build applications for business process automation? You simplify it by providing solutions such as point-and-click and drag-and-drop application builders. These visual builders accelerate the process of application development, and their short, non-technical learning curve empowers even line-of-business users—citizen developers—to build applications all by themselves (without having to rely on IT teams).

Building on this momentum of empowering citizen developers, industry analysts expect the further simplification and qualitative enhancement of visual app-building approaches in 2024, enabling citizen developers to develop and deploy more capable and complex applications than ever before.

3. The integration of no code and low code with traditional development  

What began as a replacement—as an alternative to traditional development—is now being transformed into a collaborative approach alongside it. This approach is prevalent in some novel domains across enterprises worldwide.

It is seamless integration. You integrate legacy software and legacy development approaches with no-code and low-code development approaches, and reap the benefits from this unique synergy introduces to the craft of application development. This speeds up the process of application development and empowers both technical and non-technical stakeholders to develop and deploy applications much faster.

How does low-code development impact traditional developers?  

The development processes of traditional developers are different, when compared to using the low code approach. Traditional developers have to be well versed in a "stack" - a set of programming languages and libraries that enable the development of full-fledged applications. A full fledged application needs to have a back-end - the database, and the front-end - the user-interface. The stack comprises the languages needed to build the front-end and the back-end.

Becoming a full-stack developer takes tons of effort and dedicated learning.

Low code, on the other hand, has a much shorter learning curve. The scripting languages in low code platforms, for example Deluge in the case of ManageEngine AppCreator and Zoho Creator, are easier to learn when compared to those in traditional full-stack development. Developers can quickly get up to speed and can implement complex custom logic in a fraction of the time it takes to engineer the same logic in full-stack web and mobile applications.

Ultimately, low-code development throws open the world of iterative, prototype-driven, agile solution engineering de facto to developers. Agile is possible through full-stack approaches also, but that way, when compared with low code, it takes more effort and costs more. Low code fueled agile is a much faster approach to deploying fully functional, powerful, and scalable custom web and mobile applications.

How does low-code development impact the time-to-market for apps?  

Where you previously needed 500+ lines of code to generate a user interface for an application, with low code, you can create a fully functional user interface by simply dragging and dropping desired components (with zero coding).

You used to need hundreds of lines of code to develop the backend databases for an application, you can skip back-end coding almost entirely with low-code applications. With some low-code platforms, the back end is auto-generated for you. Zero lines of code needed.

With conventional approaches, you'd have to go back to the drawing board if you want to customize your applications. However, with low code, if you want to customize your applications, you can do so easily. It's akin to editing a document using a word processor. If you want to implement complex custom logic, that is also possible easily with low-code scripting languages. The motto of each low-code platform is: do more with less, and don't reinvent the wheel!

Low-code market adoption and growth  

Low-code market adoption and growth can be analyzed through different segments.

Small and medium businesses  

The complexity of low-code platforms influenced its adoption in the early years. Those platforms that needed a bit of coding to implement logic didn't fare well in the small and medium business (SMB) sector. Those who were on the no-code side of the spectrum fared well.

However, what has transpired is these low-code platforms—which needed coding for custom logic implementation—have now simplified app development to the point that what previously needed a bit of coding can now be accomplished using a point-and-click and drag-and-drop interface.

The outlook in the SMB sector for 2024 is bright for low-code platforms because platform developers can now leverage advanced technologies to simplify the process of application development for those who are new. From a low-code adoption standpoint, this sector appears promising in the years to come.

Mid-market enterprises  

Mid-market enterprises used to run their operations on affordable tech and addressed custom operational requirements around affordable and easily modifiable solutions. The advent of low-code tools changed this. The affordable yet highly customizable low-code tools have enabled mid-market enterprises to architect robust solutions for automating and running their business processes.

The low-code outlook for 2024 also promises to be good for mid-market enterprises, as more and more of them will continue to leverage the diverse capabilities of low code.

Enterprises  

Hitherto, enterprises were reluctant to build solutions on top of low-code technologies. This is because they had already invested in tech, and had in-house or third-party systems in place for their operations. Introducing low-code solutions presented challenges such as integration with legacy and existing systems, as well as the need to invest time in getting IT teams up to speed on these platforms.

The scenario is different today. Low-code development platforms are increasingly adopted by enterprises because they augment the arsenal of a developer's toolkit. Developers can integrate legacy and contemporary enterprise software easily with low-code tools. They can prototype faster, ship fully-functional software quicker, and ensure the satisfaction of all stakeholders.

In 2024, a sizable chunk of the enterprise market will increasingly turn to the adoption of low code tools, having realized their efficacy in automating enterprise business processes and accelerating software development.

The way ahead 

Low-code tools and no-code tools stand poised to gain a lion's share of the application development market in the coming years. Organizations of all sizes will automate their processes and improve their digital solutions harnessing low-code application development platforms and no-code tools. This augurs well for multi-stakeholder empowerment and digital transformation.