Introduction to Dart

What is Dart?

Dart is a modern, object-oriented programming language developed by Google. It is designed to be easy to learn, fast, and flexible. Dart is commonly used for building mobile, desktop, web, and server applications. One of its most popular uses is in the Flutter framework for creating cross-platform mobile apps.

  • Mobile apps (using Flutter)
  • Web apps (compiled to JavaScript)
  • Desktop apps (Windows, macOS, Linux)
  • Server-side applications (using Dart VM or frameworks like Aqueduct or Shelf)

Dart is known for its simplicity, flexibility, and strong support for both Just-In-Time (JIT) compilation (for fast development cycles) and Ahead-Of-Time (AOT) compilation (for optimized production performance).


Key Features of Dart

  • Easy to Learn & Readable Syntax – Dart has a clean, C-style syntax that is familiar to developers coming from languages like Java, JavaScript, or C#.
  • Strongly Typed & Sound Null Safety – Dart helps catch errors early with static type checking and null safety by default.
  • Productivity Tools – Features like hot reload (in Flutter) allow developers to see changes instantly without restarting the app.
  • Cross-Platform Development – Dart powers Flutter, Google’s UI toolkit for building natively compiled apps for mobile, web, and desktop from a single codebase.
  • High Performance – Dart can be compiled to native machine code (AOT) for fast execution or to JavaScript for web compatibility.
  • Asynchronous Programming – Built-in support for Futures and Streams makes handling async operations simple.

Why Learn Dart?

  • Flutter’s Backbone : Dart is the primary language for Flutter, one of the fastest-growing frameworks for cross-platform app development.
  • Growing Ecosystem : With increasing adoption in mobile and web development, Dart offers strong career opportunities.
  • Versatile : Whether you're building a frontend UI, backend server, or command-line tool, Dart can handle it.

Example: A Simple Dart Program


void main() {
  print("Hello, World!");
}

Output:

Hello, World!