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The idea is simple, trace every network request from a mobile application and capture the resulting activity on the backend services that process each request. When you do this you will have all the data required to determine if a performance problem lies within the mobile device, the network, or the backend services. In reality, this is exceptionally difficult to accomplish – unless you have Instana.
Technical Challenges
Why is this so difficult to accomplish? For a couple of reasons. First, you need to be able to capture EVERY network request coming from EVERY mobile device that has your application running. This can be a very large volume of data to consume and to analyze. Second, and even more difficult, you need to be able to capture EVERY backend service call so that you can correlate all those front end mobile network requests. This is where almost every monitoring solution on the planet falls down, but not Instana. Instana traces, records, and analyzes every backend service request; no sampling of any kind, ever. Check and check!
Users Hate Slow Apps
According to a survey by Akamai, 47% of consumers expect web pages to load in two seconds or less and 20% expect mobile apps to load instantly.
Poor performing mobile applications get low ratings on app stores and cause meaningful user frustration. One app maker reported that even a 0.1 drop in an online app rating caused a 5% decline in downloads, while a 0.3 decrease resulted in a 60% drop. What a difference!
In 2019, over 50% of all internet shopping traffic came from a mobile device. Statistics show that 40% of users will go to the competitor after a bad mobile experience, yet an alarming 84% have experienced difficulty completing a mobile transaction.
In short, users hate slow apps and your business suffers when your apps are slow.
The Solution To Slow Mobile Apps
Every mobile app and version is tracked by Instana and the performance is summarized and analyzed. You can immediately see and compare performance across different application versions. Instana Mobile EUM provides exact timing data for all mobile network requests. You will have empirical data with which to classify the meanings of “slow” or “fast”.
Since Instana traces every network request, and correlates those traces with backend service requests using trace identifiers, you ALWAYS have all the data required to determine if a performance problem lies within the mobile device, the network, or the backend services. Instana also tracks every user session within the monitored mobile applications. Each session provides a detailed account of the activities performed within the app.
Mobile EUM fits seamlessly into the Instana platform. It is an extension of Website EUM and is fully integrated into Unbounded Analytics. Instana’s Mobile EUM is available today for iOS with Android support coming soon.