What OpenMage merchants actually need to know
An app channel for OpenMage brands, without the storefront rebuild
The question is not whether a mobile app makes sense for your OpenMage store. It is how to launch one without rebuilding the storefront you stayed on the platform specifically to avoid rebuilding.
Push reaches customers where email and search cannot
Email open rates have fallen for years, and the promotions folder eats a large share of what does get delivered. SMS works but carries TCPA-style compliance overhead, costs that scale with volume, and a customer-experience cap before opt-outs climb. The retention-channel ceiling for ecommerce brands sits well below where it used to.
Mobile apps change the shape of the channel. An icon on the home screen, persistent login, push notifications direct to the lock screen, and the install itself as a signal of your best customers. Push reaches the customer where email and SMS cannot, and app users are already opted in by definition.
Across the ecommerce category, app users convert at 3-7x mobile web rates, spend 10-50% more per order, and deliver roughly 3x the lifetime value. MobiLoud's own roster shows the same pattern across the Magento ecosystem and adjacent platforms: Tadashi Shoji, running on Magento, drives 18% of total online revenue through the app, with app users converting at 8.3x mobile web rates. Pharmazone drives 63% of online revenue through the app, with abandoned cart push converting at 22%. Sleefs ships 3x revenue per user and 30% higher AOV. XCVI drives 4.8x revenue per app user against the same brand's mobile web.
Every other path rebuilds your storefront from scratch
The other routes to an OpenMage mobile app all ask the same thing: rebuild your storefront in a separate codebase. Custom native (Swift, Kotlin, React Native) means replicating every Magento Connect extension, every custom module, and every theme override your team has wired in, in a different language and on a different release cycle. The rest of your store customizations come along for the ride.
The Magento 1 REST and SOAP API was not designed for what a modern mobile app needs either. Custom checkout, loyalty, and promotional rules all require custom endpoints written specifically for the app.
The cost is real (custom-native runs $500K-$1M+/year fully loaded, with Magento 1 mobile developers now a niche hire), but the deeper problem is the duplication itself. You are not paying for a mobile app; you are paying to maintain a second version of your storefront, separate from the first one. The same logic that made the Magento 2 migration unappealing argues against this route.
Your stack stays the source; our team owns the iOS and Android side
MobiLoud is the combination of a native platform and a service team. The platform bridges your live OpenMage store to an iOS and Android app and brings the features a native app needs built in: push notifications via OneSignal or Klaviyo, deep links into any product or category, persistent login, native navigation, smart banners, in-app payments, and analytics tied into GA4, Firebase, or Triple Whale. The native integrations you would otherwise build once-per-app are built into the platform once. No dependency on the Magento 1 REST or SOAP API.
Together, your existing OpenMage store plus our platform is a custom mobile app experience, built on the storefront you already operate, not a second one you rebuild from scratch. Every Magento Connect extension, custom module, and theme override that ships on the site shows up in the app automatically. The rest of your storefront works the same way.
Your OpenMage team builds for the app on the same PHP and Magento 1 stack they already use: theme code, .phtml templates, custom modules, extensions, all on the release cycle they already run. Our team guides on the app-specific patterns and applies direct customizations to the app experience when something needs to look or behave differently in the app. The native SDK integrations that come up infrequently (custom payments, native analytics) we handle from our side, and we run the iOS and Android operational track: builds and submissions under your developer accounts, OS update cycles, certificate renewals, and store policy.
"At first, we explored the viability of building our own native apps from the ground up. Managing them effectively moving forward would not have been feasible due to the disconnected nature of such an approach."
David Chamberlin, Lead Developer at Tadashi Shoji, on why the luxury fashion brand chose MobiLoud over a custom-native Magento build. The app now drives 18% of total online revenue, with app users converting at 8.3x mobile web rates.
After launch is where the channel actually compounds
We are focused on the results we see OpenMage and Magento customers achieve regularly. The launch playbook is where we start: install prompts on your site, smart banners on mobile web, QR codes, email announcements to your existing customer base, and an app-user incentive to drive the first wave of installs. The push strategy gets built into the integration we set up (abandoned cart, back-in-stock, drops, promotional campaigns), all running directly in your existing Klaviyo or OneSignal account.
On Enterprise, the work does not stop at setup. Your customer success manager runs monthly performance checkpoints against peer Magento and OpenMage merchants, builds analytics dashboards on the app channel, reviews what is working in the category, and proposes what to try next. The push strategy gets refined as the channel grows.
MobiLoud has served 2,000+ brands. The results above are not exceptional. They are what the channel delivers when it is launched and run properly. The fastest way to know whether it works for your OpenMage store is the free preview: we build a working version of your OpenMage mobile app from your live store in roughly 5 to 7 working days, so you can see exactly how it looks and feels before you commit to anything.