Why we built Volta for iOS and Android at the same time

The moment we realised one platform wasn't enough

I spent the first half of 2023 talking to EV drivers across the UK. A commuter in Manchester asked me why she'd need Volta if it only worked on her iPhone. A fleet manager in London mentioned his drivers used a mix of phones. A rideshare driver who runs 12 vehicles said three of his team members used Android. That conversation stuck with me.

The UK EV market isn't homogeneous. iOS users cluster in certain demographics, sure, but our users are also people who buy a car based on its range and where they can charge it, not their phone brand. When you're aggregating 40+ charging networks into one place and showing drivers the true total cost before they arrive, you can't afford to leave anyone out. Half a map isn't a map at all.

What 'the same time' actually meant in practice

Building simultaneously for iOS and Android sounds like doubling the work. It isn't quite that linear. We made a deliberate choice about architecture: the core logic that pulls data from those 40+ networks, calculates the real total cost (per kWh, parking, idle fees, taxes), and plans routes happens in one place. The UI, the gestures, the notifications, the way you interact with the map on your phone; that's where iOS and Android diverge.

This approach meant we could ship both versions without either one feeling like the second-class citizen. A feature that lands in iOS gets ported to Android on the same cycle, not three months later. When we built the arrive-to-charge check-in confirmation, it worked on both platforms from day one. Same with the community charging marketplace, the fleet management dashboard, the accessibility filters for accessible bays. No platform gets left waiting.

The real labour was in thinking like both an iPhone user and an Android user simultaneously. iOS guidelines expect certain patterns; Android users expect different ones. Both expectations are valid. We weren't trying to make them identical; we were trying to make them both feel at home.

Two app stores, one user experience

On launch week, we watched both versions get approved. I refreshed the App Store and Google Play probably more times than I should admit. The moment they both went live felt like opening day at a new office: you've built it, you've tested it, and now actual people are downloading it and living in it.

What mattered most was that whether someone was starting their journey on an iPhone or an Android phone, they saw the same map. When they filtered for accessible bays, or they looked up the true total cost at a Shell Recharge location, or they checked their receipt history for expense export, the experience was consistent. Not identical in look; consistent in intent.

We took platform-specific features seriously too. Push notifications work differently on iOS and Android, so we tuned them. The way you navigate the map has subtle differences based on what feels natural in each ecosystem. These aren't bugs; they're respect for how people actually use their phones.

Why this matters for someone planning a journey

Journey planning with route-level charging visibility is one of our core features. You're driving from Bristol to Edinburgh. You want to know where you can charge along the way, what it'll actually cost you at each stop, and how to optimise your route. That's a complex calculation: it means pulling data from multiple networks, cross referencing accessibility options if you need them, calculating total cost including parking and idle fees, and presenting it all in real time.

If we'd shipped that on iOS first and made Android wait, we'd have had half the market in the dark. A fleet manager with 200 Android users couldn't use Volta for consolidated billing and policy controls. A homeowner trying to earn from their home charger through the community marketplace would have been locked out if they only had an Android phone. That's not building a product; that's building a toy.

The dual-platform approach meant every feature we designed had to work across both ecosystems from the start. That discipline actually made us better at product thinking. It forced us to separate the idea from the interface, to ask 'what is the core value here?' before we worried about how it looked on a 6-inch screen versus a 6.5-inch one.

What we learned about support and updates

Four months after launch, we found a bug in how idle fees were being calculated on certain networks. The fix took us two days. Rolling it out took one afternoon, because we weren't managing two separate code bases. We pushed an update to both stores at the same time, and both sets of users got the fix on the same day.

That's the hidden win of building for two platforms in parallel: operational simplicity. One test suite. One release process. One set of conversations about what matters and what doesn't. When a new charging network gets added to Volta, or when we ship route optimisation for premium members, it lands on both platforms together. No one's waiting. No one's second-guessing whether the Android version will catch up.

We also learn from both platforms equally. A user experience insight from Android users informs how we design for iOS, and vice versa. When fleet managers told us they needed better cost-centre reporting, we built it in a way that made sense on both screens. When commuters asked for easier receipt history access, we found a solution that felt native to each platform.