Context and Challenge
Guesty’s platform covers multiple domains of the property management sphere — finance, reservations, communications, operations, etc. — each handled by separate tech teams. The mobile app had to unify these diverse features into one intuitive, high-quality mobile experience. However, it was hard to do with the existing outdated application.
The mobile solution acquired by Guesty was a quick-to-market Ionic-based wrapper around a web app. While functional, it suffered from slow performance, unstable architecture, and poor integration with Guesty’s backend systems.
The key challenges of preserving this application included the following:
- The app was built on legacy Ionic code that was unstable and couldn’t scale well.
- There was no dedicated QA team to catch bugs and ensure quality.
- The growth of users put pressure on the app’s performance and support.
- Delivering new features quickly risked causing instability in the app.
Client’s Objectives
To address these challenges, Guesty partnered with Forbytes and set clear objectives:
- Seamlessly integrate and reflect multiple product domains in the mobile app
- Improve performance, stability, and reduce crashes and bugs
- Accelerate mobile feature delivery to support Guesty’s product roadmap
- Own the mobile domain end-to-end, including development, testing, monitoring, and incident response
How We Approached the Project
Taking Ownership of the Mobile Domain
Forbytes became fully responsible for Guesty’s mobile app, which serves as the unified touchpoint reflecting functionality across all Guesty domains. The partnership with Guesty unfolded in several phases:
Phase 1: Initial integration
We began by analyzing the acquired Ionic app and integrating it with Guesty’s backend to ensure feature continuity and data access.
Phase 2: Hybrid rewrite
To improve UX and backend integration, we rewrote the app core views in React Native but still wrapped it with Ionic.
Phase 3: Full rebuild from scratch
As a continuation of the optimization effort, aimed at improving the app’s stability and maintainability, the team decided to move entirely to React Native, removing Ionic. This clean-slate approach enabled a scalable, modular architecture aligned with Guesty’s domain-driven backend.
Phase 4: Testing and internal release
We introduced robust end-to-end automated testing and real-time monitoring tools (Grafana, Coralogix, and others). The app was released internally for feedback cycles.
Phase 5: Production release and stabilization
The new native app launched across platforms, supported by CI/CD pipelines ensuring quality and continuous feature delivery.
Phase 6: Continuous development and optimization
We adopted a hybrid feature delivery strategy: 70% native features and 30% webview for complex web-based flows. This balanced performance with rapid feature expansion, achieving a 3x increase in mobile features and a significant drop in bug-related support tickets.
Solution Overview
Guesty Mobile is a native mobile application that enables property managers to run their hospitality operations seamlessly from anywhere. As the tech team fully responsible for this product, Forbytes played a central role in turning the app into a stable, high-performing, and feature-rich solution.
The mobile app reflects functionality from nearly all of Guesty’s domains. While each internal tech team focuses on their specific area, our role is to ensure that all of those features work flawlessly and intuitively on mobile.
Key Features of Guesty’s Mobile App
All-in-one calendar
We implemented a unified calendar view where users can manage past, current, and future reservations. It offers real-time access to availability across all properties.
Unified inbox
Forbytes helped consolidate guest communications from multiple channels into one inbox. Users can view reservation details, respond to messages, and leave internal notes — all from their phones.
Task management on the go
Our team enabled mobile-based task assignment and tracking to support on-the-ground operations. This includes workflows for cleaners, maintenance staff, and front-desk teams.
Reservation management
We developed native flows to create, edit, and approve reservations directly from mobile. This gives users complete flexibility to manage bookings while away from their desks.
Channel oversight
The mobile app allows users to monitor and manage listings across platforms like Airbnb and Booking.com — reducing the risk of double bookings and missed opportunities.
Hybrid webview integration
To speed up time-to-market and avoid over-complication, we introduced webview support for complex features that didn’t require native implementation. This approach ensures smooth performance while keeping the app lightweight and easy to maintain.
Thanks to our team’s ownership and continuous innovation, Guesty’s mobile app is now a reliable, intuitive, and scalable tool trusted by over 20,000 users worldwide.
Results and Impact
- High-performing native mobile app: The rewritten app replaced a fragile legacy solution and delivered a smooth, responsive user experience across iOS and Android platforms.
- Significant growth in feature set: With Forbytes’ support, the number of mobile features tripled — allowing users to manage messaging, reservations, tasks, and channel operations directly from their phones.
- Fewer support tickets: Thanks to proactive monitoring, automated testing, and improved app stability, the volume of support requests due to mobile-related bugs dropped by 80%.
- Reliable and scalable architecture: The new architecture is modular and future-ready. It allows for faster rollout of new features, easier debugging, and smoother integration with Guesty’s core infrastructure.
- Consistent feature delivery without downtime: New features are added regularly without disrupting user experience. Our real-time monitoring and test coverage ensure each release maintains high quality.
Technology Stack
Backend: Node.js, Typescript, Nest
Frontend: React, Redux
Database: MongoDB, PostgreSQL
Test tools: Mocha, Jest, Chai, Sinon
Cloud storage: Snowflake
Cloud platform: AWS, Google Cloud
Logs/Monitoring tools: Grafana, Prometheus, AWS CloudWatch, InfluxDB, Coralogix, Kibana, Datadog
Virtualization: Docker, Nomad
Continuous integration: CircleCI, Jenkins, Split.io, GitHub, Vault, Jira
Other tools: Redis, Rabbit, MQKafka
Key Takeaways and Lessons Learned
Success factors:
- Ownership of a cross-domain product: Our team managed this complexity by aligning with domain-specific teams and maintaining full responsibility for consistent and reliable mobile representation.
- Strategic migration from legacy code: Rather than patching the old app, we made the strategic decision to build it from scratch. This clean-slate approach enabled more scalable architecture and faster feature delivery.
- Smart feature delivery through a hybrid approach: We used a balanced mix of native features and webview. This allowed us to introduce complex functionalities with minimal impact on app performance.
- Proactive quality monitoring and automation: We implemented a robust quality assurance setup. This included automated tests, real-time monitoring, and alert systems for quick issue detection.
- Agile delivery and continuous feature expansion: With Forbytes’ support, the number of mobile features tripled. Our team consistently delivered new capabilities while ensuring backward compatibility and stability.
Challenges overcome:
- Legacy Ionic codebase: Transitioned from an unstable wrapped website app to a fully native mobile experience.
- No dedicated QA team: Built automated testing pipelines and monitoring to maintain high quality with developer-owned QA.
- Cross-domain complexity: Coordinated with multiple backend teams to reflect diverse product features accurately on mobile.
- Balancing performance & feature depth: Used a hybrid native/webview approach to keep the app fast without losing functionality.
- Maintaining stability with growth: Implemented CI/CD and alerting to support continuous delivery for 20,000+ users.
