Dropdowns Should Be the UI of Last Resort
IMHO the best option for inputting a small integer value is the combination of a text field and a stepper, which has been around for a long time and has its own name (for touchscreen operation, the +/- buttons could be made larger and horizontally, like the steppers shown):<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spinner_(computing)" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spinner_(computing)</a><p>For dates, a calendar control would probably be appropriate.<p>I'm a bit puzzled as to why dropdowns are a "4 tap operation" - once to dropdown and once to select, with possibly some intervening scrolling if it's a lengthy list. Where are the extra 2 taps coming from...?