Compare the Top Free Development Frameworks as of July 2025

What are Free Development Frameworks?

Development frameworks are code libraries and development tools that streamline the development process for developers that build applications. Development frameworks simplify the process of programming in different languages. There are a variety of different types of development frameworks including web development frameworks, mobile app development frameworks, frontend and backend frameworks, and more. Compare and read user reviews of the best Free Development Frameworks currently available using the table below. This list is updated regularly.

  • 1
    Ionic

    Ionic

    Drifty

    The Ionic Platform allows you to bring your apps to market faster with an integrated app platform built on the leading cross-platform mobile SDK. Build, secure, and deliver new mobile apps—and transform existing ones—across iOS, Android, and Web platforms from a single codebase. Full scalability—Grow from prototype to production to enterprise-scale, without having to think about capacity, reliability, or performance. Better apps, everywhere—Slash your development time and costs with a platform that lets you write once and deploy anywhere—iOS, Android, and Web. The core of the Ionic development experience is Ionic Capacitor, a cross platform native runtime that runs equally well on native iOS and Android mobile devices, as well as any web browser. The big difference is that, unlike traditional native development or cross-platform approaches, the UI of a Capacitor app runs primarily in the browser.
    Starting Price: Free
  • 2
    .NET MAUI

    .NET MAUI

    Microsoft

    .NET Multi-platform App UI (.NET MAUI) is a framework for building modern, multi-platform, natively compiled iOS, Android, macOS, and Windows apps using C# and XAML in a single codebase. .NET MAUI uses the latest, modern technologies for building native apps on Android, iOS, macOS, and Windows abstracting them into one common framework built on .NET 6. Native apps look and feel like the operating system on which they belong by default and layouts are fully adapted to each device automatically with no additional code. Platform APIs are available directly from C# to access over 60 platform features from a single cross-platform API including access to things like isolated storage, sensors, geolocation, camera, and a whole lot more with no compromises.
    Starting Price: Free
  • 3
    jQuery Mobile

    jQuery Mobile

    OpenJS Foundation

    jQuery Mobile is an HTML5-based user interface system designed to make responsive websites and apps that are accessible on all smartphones, tablets, and desktop devices. jQuery Mobile framework takes the "write less, do more" mantra to the next level: Instead of writing unique applications for each mobile device or OS, the jQuery mobile framework allows you to design a single highly-branded responsive website or application that will work on all popular smartphone, tablet, and desktop platforms. We believe that your website or app should feel like your brand, not any particular OS. To make building highly customized themes easy, we've created ThemeRoller for mobile to make it easy to drag and drop colors and download a custom theme. For polished visuals without the bloat, we leverage CSS3 properties. We recommend using our tool to build a custom bundle that contains only the components you need.
    Starting Price: Free
  • 4
    Vaadin

    Vaadin

    Vaadin

    Vaadin is a web app development platform for Java. It helps you build reliable web apps with great UX faster than before. Building an enterprise web app involves a lot of moving pieces. Vaadin simplifies the process with an integrated web app development platform for Java backends. Vaadin comes with all the components, frameworks, and tools you need to build a reliable, secure, app with great UX. Research shows that good user experience (UX) increases employee engagement, helps digital transformations to succeed, and avoids costly mistakes. The Vaadin Design System provides UI components and UX patterns that help you build consistently good user experiences in every app. Better yet, you can use it to build a custom design system for your organization. Vaadin comes with 45+ UI components that help you build consistent UIs fast. The theme can be customized to match your brand. Vaadin components work with screen readers and assistive devices.
    Starting Price: $139 per month
  • 5
    Helidon

    Helidon

    Helidon

    Helidon is a cloud-native, open‑source set of Java libraries for writing microservices that run on a fast web core powered by Netty. Helidon Níma is the first Java microservices framework based on virtual threads. Helidon is designed to be simple to use, with tooling and examples to get you going quickly. Since Helidon is simply a collection of Java libraries running on a fast Netty core, there is no extra overhead or bloat. Helidon supports MicroProfile and provides familiar APIs like JAX-RS, CDI, and JSON-P/B. Our implementation runs on our fast Helidon Reactive WebServer. Helidon Reactive WebServer provides a modern functional programming model and runs on top of Netty. Lightweight, flexible, and reactive, the Helidon WebServer provides a simple-to-use and fast foundation for your microservices. With support for health checks, metrics, tracing, and fault tolerance, Helidon has what you need to write cloud-ready applications that integrate with Prometheus, Jaeger/Zipkin, etc.
    Starting Price: Free
  • 6
    Wisej.NET

    Wisej.NET

    Ice Tea Group

    Wisej.NET provides a platform and set of tools designed to ease the burden of developing, testing, deploying, and maintaining complex AI-powered business software. It bridges the gap between traditional WinForms-style desktop applications and the web by empowering developers to leverage their existing .NET and C# or VB.NET) skills. Developers are able to use the tools they are familiar with, like a pixel-perfect design surface and drag-and-drop controls with the languages they are comfortable with (C# or VB.NET) to build real-time web applications without having to learn HTML, CSS, or JavaScript. They can stay in their favorite IDE like Visual Studio to take advantage of features like IntelliSense, integrated debugging, design surfaces and source control integration. Front-end developers can leverage their knowledge of web technologies to augment applications and seamlessly integrate third-party packages like HTML5 charting libraries and ASP.NET controls.
    Starting Price: $990
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