Learn about the limitations of Expo and related services.
We believe Expo tools are a great option for anyone looking to create amazing cross-platform apps quickly. Nonetheless, everyone's project is unique, and there may be reasons Expo is not the right choice for what you're building. Read on for some reasons why you may not want to use certain Expo tools with your project.
For more information on what current limitations exist with EAS, see the following:
EAS Build is designed to work for any React Native project, whether or not you also use Expo Prebuild or manage your own native files. In some situations, you may need to change your project configuration, or it may be incompatible with your app. Learn more.
EAS Update is a hosted service that serves updates for projects using the expo-updates library. You can use it to fix small bugs and push quick fixes a snap in between app store submissions. In some situations, not be the right fit for a project. Learn more.
EAS Metadata helps creating or maintaining an app in the stores as easy as possible by using one configuration file. In some situations, not be the right fit for a project. Learn more.
Push Notifications are an important feature, no matter what kind of app you're building. In some situations, you might want to know about common issues when setting up push notifications with Expo. Learn more.
Similar to development builds, the bare workflow also provides access to the underlying native projects and any native code. It's a "bare" native project where you can make direct changes to the project's native android/ and ios/ directories rather than continuously generating them on demand using the Expo config and prebuild.
EAS Build is compatible with bare workflow projects if you check in the native directories, but no longer runs prebuild, as that could overwrite any manual customizations you've made to the native project files. You'll have to configure the native directories on your own with native tools such as Android Studio or Xcode.
Expo Go provides a quick way to get started with your app development. It comes with a pre-configured set of libraries known as the Expo SDK. This makes experimentation much faster and brings the mobile development experience much closer to the web development experience.
Like any other tool, it too has its own limitations:
We strongly recommend any projects that require additional libraries with native code to migrate to development builds. It's like creating a version of Expo Go that is specifically customized to your app's needs.
To start developing your project, see Installation to get started. If you have unanswered questions, see Common Questions.