Desktop apps
Flex Solutions is a product engineering studio and electron app development company. We build native-feel Electron + React applications for macOS, Windows, and Linux. If you're trying to convert a web app to a desktop app, this is the page for how we actually do it: fast cold-start, native menus and dialogs, real keyboard shortcuts, and code-signed auto-updates that won't spook your IT team.
We are a specialized engineering studio run by the people writing the code — meet the team to see who will be building your app. No account manager relay, no offshore hand-off.
Can You Convert An Existing Web App Into A Desktop App?
Yes, and if your product already runs in a browser, most of the UI layer carries over as-is. What actually changes is everything around it: the main and renderer process boundary, native menus and dialogs, an IPC layer for talking to the OS, an offline data store with sync, and a signed, auto-updating build pipeline. That surrounding layer is where most Electron conversions fall apart, so it’s where we spend most of the engagement, not on the UI.
How We Convert A Web App To A Desktop App: The Process
- 01
Discovery & shape
We read your existing web app, map out the desktop-only surface area (native menus, file system access, offline needs), and write a one-page shape doc. You sign off on scope before we open electron-builder.
Shape docScope freezeRisk registerWEEK 1 - 02
Shell + signing
We stand up the Electron shell, wire the IPC boundary with contextIsolation on and preload-only IPC, and get a signed, notarised build into internal distribution. Signing happens before features, not after.
Signed installersCI pipelineCrash reportingWEEKS 2–3 - 03
Feature build
We build the real product against your real backend in two-week vertical slices. Weekly demo, and a new build lands in your team's update channel every Friday.
Weekly buildsFriday demosTracked roadmapWEEKS 4–10 - 04
Hardening & handover
Performance budget, accessibility pass, staged auto-update rollout, an IT runbook, and the keys to your signing infrastructure. Then a 30-day support tail.
Performance auditIT runbookKey handover30-day supportWEEKS 11–14
What You Get with Our Electron Development Services
Web teams keep asking for desktop apps and getting Electron wrappers that nobody likes using. We build the version your customers will keep open all day — fast cold-start, native menus, native dialogs, real keyboard shortcuts, code-signed updates that don’t scare IT.
Production-ready Electron + React shell with TypeScript, Vite, and ESM
Auto-update pipeline (Squirrel, Sparkle) wired into your CI
Apple notarisation and Windows EV signing from day one
Native menus, tray, deep links, file associations, and a clean IPC boundary
Crash reporting, telemetry, and a reproducible offline mode
Handover doc, runbook, and a 30-day support tail
Capabilities - Inside The Engagement
- 01
Secure Electron app shell
Electron + Vite + React 19 + TypeScript, with a strict main/renderer boundary and preload-only IPC
- 02
Native desktop UX & integration
Real menu bars, tray icons, and OS conventions instead of a web frame. Integrates cleanly with our SaaS product engineering audits for apps requiring complex data sync
- 03
Cross-platform auto-updates
Squirrel.Mac, Squirrel.Windows, AppImage, with staged rollouts, channels, and a kill switch
- 04
Apple notarization & Windows EV code signing
Apple notarisation, Windows EV cert, hardened runtime, entitlements, and a documented key rotation process
- 05
Reliable offline mode & local database sync
SQLite or IndexedDB with a sync layer that handles conflicts, retries, and partial outages without losing user work
- 06
Performance profiling & memory optimization
Cold-start under 1.5s, idle RAM under 200MB, profiled against a budget instead of a guess
The Electron Tech Stack We Use, In Order
These are opinions earned across 12+ shipped desktop apps. We swap parts only when the engagement actually calls for it.
- + SHELLElectron 30+Viteelectron-builderelectron-vite
- + UIReact 18TypeScriptTailwindRadixTanStack
- + STORAGESQLiteDrizzleIndexedDBCRDT (Yjs)
- + OPSSentryPostHogGitHub ActionsSparkle / Squirrel
Electron vs. the alternatives: how we decide
| Comparison factor | Electron | Tauri | Native (Swift/C#/Qt) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Codebase reuse from your web app | High. Most of the UI ports directly | Medium. UI ports over, backend usually gets rewritten in Rust | Low. Basically a full rewrite |
| Typical binary size | 80–150MB | 5–15MB | Varies, usually the smallest |
| Idle memory (our builds) | Under 200MB, tuned | Lower by default | Lowest, since it's OS-native |
| Time to first signed build | Fastest. The tooling for signing and auto-update is the most mature | Slower. Signing and update tooling is still young | Slowest. Every platform needs its own pipeline |
| Best fit | Teams shipping a real product fast, with a web team already in place | Teams with Rust capacity who want a smaller footprint | Teams that need deep OS integration and don't need cross-platform |
We default to Electron for SaaS teams converting an existing web app, mostly because it reuses the most code and has the most mature signing and auto-update tooling. Those are the two things that actually break in production. That said, we’ll tell you upfront if your case fits Tauri or native better. We’d rather lose the engagement than force the wrong stack on you.
Numbers From Our Last 12 Builds
Electron reuses the most of an existing web codebase, and it has the most battle-tested signing and auto-update tooling of the three options. Tauri produces smaller binaries, but its tooling for code-signing and staged rollouts is younger. Native gives you the tightest OS integration, but that means a separate codebase per platform. We make the call based on your team's existing stack and how much of your web app needs to carry over.
Yes, this is most of what we do day to day. We map your web app's screens to a native shell, then add the IPC boundary, native menus and dialogs, offline storage, and a signed auto-update pipeline around your existing UI and backend.
We set up Apple notarisation and Windows EV certificate signing during the shell phase, weeks 2 through 3, before any feature work starts. At handover, you get a documented signing chain and a key-rotation runbook, so your team isn't stuck depending on us to renew certificates down the line.
No, and honestly, you don't want us to. We wire in Squirrel.Mac, Squirrel.Windows, or AppImage update mechanisms with staged rollouts and channels rather than building custom update infrastructure from zero. Across our last 12 shipped apps, that approach has held a 99.4% update success rate.
We build and sign for both Intel and Apple Silicon Macs, and we target Windows ARM builds when your user base needs it. This gets scoped explicitly in the Week 1 shape doc, so it's never a surprise late in the build.
Engagements are fixed-scope, typically 8 to 14 weeks, with a team of two engineers and one designer. Cost depends on platform count, offline and sync complexity, and how much of your existing web app is reusable. Tell us what you're building and we'll send back a one-page shape doc and a fee letter within four working days.
Ship The Desktop App Your Customers Actually Keep Open
Tell us what you’re building. We’ll send back a one-page shape doc and a fee letter within four working days.