Imagine an online world where your digital identity is truly yours, you control your assets, and no other middleman steps in. Sounds ideal, right? Well, that’s what dApps provide!
But it is not all sunshine and roses; there are various challenges that come in the way of the development of these apps. Looking to learn about them? We’ve got you covered!
In this blog post, we are going to explore some challenges of DApps and address how to overcome them effectively while we dive into the domain.
Before that, let’s see what exactly dApps are!
Understanding Decentralised Applications
It is essential that we first understand decentralized apps and their differentiation from typical centralized apps before discussing their specific drawbacks.
Decentralized apps or dApps are newer versions of traditional apps with many more backed features that are smarter, more secure, and highly reliable.
These are software programs operating on a blockchain or P2P network, instead of on some centralized server. Rather than a single entity controlling a particular conventional application, dApps run with a distributed architecture. These are maintained by the members of the community; hence, the very nature of these implies being resistant to any form of censorship.
Key Challenges in DApp Development
Let us check some of the challenges that we face when developing DApps:
Onboarding Users
The biggest challenge that comes in the way of building dApps is with onboarding users. Crypto and blockchain native users adapt quickly, but the challenge comes when we need to onboard the people who are using web2 or the non-blockchain community, because there is a lot of learning curve and hurdles due to unfamiliar concepts like wallets, gas fees, and seed phrases.
Solution: Developers should focus on making UIs friendlier for end-users, integrating social logins, and having educational content ready for general users on Web3, blockchains, and dApps.
Design Challenges
Most dApps lack a polished user experience due to the minimal UX research performed for dApps. Traditional UX metrics may not capture all the features of DApp interactions adequately. Actions on the blockchain are often irreversible, and building trust through clear UI design and transparent feedback is crucial.
Solution: Investing in Web3-focused UI/UX research, conducting tests, and designing around transparency, control, and transaction feedback.
Scalability and Performance of a Blockchain
The advantage that public blockchain, such as Ethereum, has is in the security and decentralization context, but at the cost of network congestion and transaction fees during periods of high demand. Transaction confirmations are delayed, and the cost is higher when there is only a high burst of starters.
Solution: Consider Layer 2 solutions like Optimism or Arbitrum, or we can choose alternative chains like Polygon, Avalanche, or Solana for scalability.
Lack of Mobile Availability
We have all these wholesome dApps, but sadly, the majority of them are only for web apps. dApps are not yet mobile native. There is only a small number of dApps that are available for smartphones. The positive news here is that we see making big improvements in this space, but we still have a long road to cover.
Solution: Create mobile-native DApps using Web3 mobile SDKs, for example, WalletConnect and Web3Modal.
Complexity in Smart Contracts
The core of any DApp is a smart contract, a self-executing agreement written in code logic. It controls everything, including transactions and governance. So smart contracts cannot really be altered once deployed on blockchains, unlike conventional code, whereby a minor bug, even one with the smallest impact, could potentially drain an infinite amount of money.
Solution: Firms should work towards thoroughly auditing smart contracts, making use of standard libraries such as OpenZeppelin, and applying upgradeable contract patterns wherever possible.Lack of Regulatory Compliance
Since DApps operate on the blockchain, which neither has solid regulations yet nor established policy guidelines, legal uncertainty surrounds DApps, considering this may hamper their extremely wide adoption by mainstream industries.
Solution: Companies should work with legal advisors to ensure compliance. Build geo-fencing into DApps to restrict access where regulations are strict or unclear.
Vulnerabilities – Hacks & Exploits
The biggest concern of decentralized applications is security. Users have become wary of high-profile hacks that may occur, such as rug pulls and exploits of some protocols. The risk landscape stretches from smart contract vulnerabilities to manipulation of oracles and phishing.
Solution: Security-first is the secret to succeeding in this practice. Teams implement multi-signature wallets for sensitive activities, incorporate trusted oracles, and conduct independent audits to minimize the number of vulnerabilities.
Scalability & Performance
When we compare dApps with any of their centralized applications, whether in the banking sector or gaming, one big problem is their lack of speed and scalability issues. When such happens, processes take unnecessary time and affect the network’s capacity.
Solution: To mitigate some of the issues, several innovations are under development to maximize transaction throughput and efficiency, including L2 scale-up techniques and sharding. A high-throughput blockchain may also be chosen.
Lack of Skilled Developers
Companies in the business of building dApps often face the issue that when they have projects to complete and need to hire developers, there is a significant shortage of devs in this field. For instance, when establishing a dApp, firms look for blockchain and non-blockchain experts who are experts in finance workflow and technologies.
Solution: Promote training programs, contribute to open-source projects, and hire developers having cross-domain skills.
High Transaction Fees & Low Liquidity
Liquidity refers to the speed at which any digital asset can be bought or sold. Low liquidity refers to the market’s volatility, which is causing an increase in crypto prices and a lack of assets. Liquidity dries up, making it more costly to execute a trade: buying and selling at sky-high prices if the coin you want to buy is not supported.
Solution: Include liquidity protocols like Uniswap or Curve, favour lower-fee chains, and include liquidity aggregators.
Final Words
Designing and developing dApps is truly a challenging task and one that needs a problem-solving approach rather than a business approach.
There are several companies that are actively working to overcome them with innovative solutions. One such company is Technoloader, a leader in this space.
It is the leading dApp development company, having a team of highly experienced developers and more than 8 years of experience in building decentralized applications. They have developed secure, scalable, and user-friendly dApps for more than 150 clients worldwide.
