We had been using Angular since 2015 when we first launched Trukky in India. Just a couple of years ago, developers were mainly debating on whether they should be using Angular vs React for their projects. But over the course of the last couple of years, we saw a growth of interest in a third player called Vue.js. So, we moved to Vue in 2017 and now after much consideration, we are moving to Next.js
We cover various aspects of Angular, Vue, and React/Next to see how they suit your needs. This post is not just a guide on Angular vs React vs Vue but aims to provide a structure to help judge front-end JavaScript frameworks in general. In case a new framework arrives next year, you will know exactly what parameters to look at! We will also share insights from Trukky’s experience with such frameworks.
Angular, developed by Google, was first released in 2010, making it the oldest of the lot. It is a TypeScript-based JavaScript framework. A substantial shift occurred in 2016 on the release of Angular 2 (and the dropping of the “JS” from the original name – AngularJS). Angular 2+ is known as just Angular. Although AngularJS (version 1) still gets updates, we will focus the discussion on Angular. The latest stable version is Angular 10, which was released in June 2020.
Vue, also known as Vue.js, is the youngest member of the group. It was developed by ex-Google employee Evan You in 2014. Over the last three years, Vue has seen a substantial shift in popularity, even though it doesn’t have the backing of a large company. The current stable version is 2.6, released in February 2019 (with some small incremental releases since then). Vue 3, currently in the alpha phase, is planning to move to TypeScript.
React, developed by Facebook, was initially released in 2013. Facebook uses React extensively in its products (Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp). The current stable version is 16.X, released in November 2018 (with smaller incremental updates since then). Next.js is a framework built by Vercel. It’s open-source, based on Node.js and Babel, and it integrates with React to develop single-page applications. It makes Serversside rendering very easy. According to nextjs.org, “With Next.js, server rendering React applications has never been easier, no matter where your data is coming from.”
Next.js also supports static exporting, pre-rendering, and has a lot more nice features like automatic building size optimization, faster dev compilation, and preview mode. Next.js provides Trukky an advantage to target its remote audience such as users who are interacting with our services and applications on their smartphones or using 2G/3G connections. By simplifying server-side rendering and splitting the code, it allows automatic optimization and partial exporting statically. This allows websites to have both static web pages and server-rendered web pages.
