React vs Vue: Which One To Choose in 2023?

Introduction

Nowadays JavaScript frameworks are vital for app development and many people struggle to choose between React and Vue for their projects. 

Despite many years of discussion, choosing a clear winner is not an easy task as both of them have pros and cons. We’ve prepared this guide to help you choose between React vs Vue and understand which one suits you best.

What is React.js

Facebook developed ReactJS as an open-source JavaScript library to help developers with building user interfaces.

React.js is a mix of simplicity and intense concentration on UX (user experience). However, you would need third-party solutions because React is responsible for just the View layer of the MVC model. For some developers, it’s a benefit because it allows for total freedom while choosing Model and Controller libraries.

React development services follows a declarative style of programming. The component-based approach allows for the highest speed and flexibility during building complex web applications. 

The motto of React is “Learn once, write everywhere” as there is the possibility of reusing the existing code in other projects in any way you like.

Pros and cons of React.js

If you want more detailed information on the pros and cons of React, we recommend reading this article.

Companies using React.js

What is Vue.js?

Vue is a progressive JavaScript framework that developers can use to build user interfaces. Contrary to monolithic frameworks like Angular, Vue is incrementally adaptable by design.

Similarly to React, the core library is focused on the View layer only. But if you want to integrate Vue with other libraries or existing projects, there’s no problem at all.

Vue.js can be characterised simply by three adjectives:

• Approachable – if you know HTML, CSS, and JS, all you have to read the guide and you are ready to go!
• Performant – thanks to three things: minimum optimisation, gzipped size of 20KB and virtual DOM.
• Versatile – its ecosystem is incrementally adaptable and scales easily between a library and a full-featured framework.

Pros and cons of Vue

Companies using Vue.js

React vs Vue: Head-to-head comparison

React vs Vue: Business Advantages

React.js in the Business Landscape

• Established and Widely Used: React.js has become one of the most widely adopted front-end frameworks and is extensively used by businesses across various industries. Its maturity and stability make it a reliable choice for enterprise-level applications.
• Large Talent Pool: React.js’s popularity has led to the growth of a large and skilled talent pool. Finding developers with React.js expertise is generally easier, which is advantageous for businesses looking to expand their development teams or find external resources.
• Reusability and Scalability: React.js’s component-based architecture promotes code reusability, making it easier to maintain and scale applications over time. This modularity helps businesses build and manage complex UIs effectively.
• React Native for Mobile Development: React.js’s compatibility with React Native allows businesses to leverage their existing React.js knowledge and codebase to build cross-platform mobile applications. This reduces development costs and time-to-market for mobile projects.
• Industry Support and Tools: React.js has robust community support and a vast ecosystem of third-party libraries, tools, and frameworks. This support ecosystem provides businesses with access to a wide range of resources and accelerates development processes.

Vue.js in the Business Landscape:

• Adoption and Popularity: Vue.js has gained significant traction in recent years and has seen widespread adoption by both small startups and large enterprises. Its ease of use, flexibility, and excellent documentation have contributed to its popularity.
• Rapid Development: Vue.js enables developers to build robust and scalable applications quickly. Its component-based architecture and reactive data binding system streamline development, allowing teams to iterate and deliver products faster.
• Developer Productivity: Vue.js provides developers with a productive and enjoyable development experience. Its simplicity, clear syntax, and well-documented ecosystem contribute to increased developer efficiency and satisfaction.
• Corporate Support: Vue.js is backed by a strong corporate sponsor, Vue.js Core Team, which ensures its ongoing development and maintenance. This corporate support provides stability and confidence for businesses considering Vue.js for their projects.

React vs Vue: Technical Comparison

React vs Vue: Similarities

We have to remember that Evan You, the Vue creator, used React as a source of inspiration, so they have some similarities, like:

• Composable and reactive view components
• Concentration on a core library and handling routing and global state management with companion libraries
• Usage of virtual DOM
• JavaScript code
• PWA support
• Possibility of working with any existing web apps

React vs Vue: Data binding

Vue.js is using two-way data binding. Whenever you change any element of the interface, your model state changes automatically too.

This sounds simple, but if you work on a large project and want to have a good data overview and debug easier, it is better to use React with one-way data binding.

It renders the change in the interface element, only after the model state is updated first. And whenever you change the UI components, the model state stays the same with no changes.

Vue vs React: Desktop and mobile development

If you use React and want to build native mobile apps working on Android and iOS, there is a platform called React Native.

It’s a massive benefit for experienced React developers because instead of learning a completely new technology, they can take advantage of existing skills to create React apps.

What’s more, with React Native it’s possible to reuse up to 99% of code between Android and iOS with React-like components.

Although Vue.js doesn’t have a dedicated platform like React Native, it doesn’t mean you can’t develop native applications.

Vue developers can use either Weex (cross-platform UI framework) to create React Native-like platform or a plugin called NativeScript, which allows them to write Vue applications and compile them to native iOS/Android apps. Another option is Vue Native, which integrates the benefits of Vue and React Native ecosystems and allows the building of cross-platform native apps.

However, React, and Vue have something in common here – during web app development, you can use Electron with both of them.

React vs Vue: JSX vs Templates

One of the reasons for newcomers to choose Vue could be templates.

They are based on HTML and are easier to read and write to anyone that has been working with HTML before, especially when you come from an Angular environment.

React, on the other hand, has JSX which gives you a huge advantage of using all the bless of JavaScript language. It is a genius component made from markup and JavaScript logic in the same file.

The choice between HTML templates and JSX depends on personal preferences. JSX can feel more flexible and powerful, especially in the biggest projects. And in the same time, with templates, Vue developers have a clear separation of concerns, which prevents them from injecting too much logic into views.

Vue vs React: Tooling

Since 2016 React provides a third-party CLI tool – create-react-app, that helps developers speed up some work aspects like app development, adding scripts etc. 

Before, React developers had to copy the files from previous apps or configure everything from scratch. It didn’t take loads of time but was a rather boring task. 

On the other hand, there’s Vue with its own tool – vue cli, which enables quick project creation. Vue cli has many benefits, like adding plugins anytime during the project or easy improvements.

Vue vs React: Learning curve

React uses JSX, which is a syntax extension to JavaScript. It can be used to describe how the user interface should look like. It’s a relatively new approach that React developers need to learn and adapt if they want to use it daily.

Another issue is that in the case of React, using third-party components is almost inevitable. And developers need to learn how to do that.

Vue.js is easier to absorb than React. If you decide to go with Vue, you can use either standard HTML, CSS, and JavaScript or JSX as in the case of React.

The critical thing about Vue is that it adopted the best concepts of React and Angular. Because of that, experienced developers in either of the two technologies have some advantages here.

Documentations of React and Vue are both well-written, but the latter is considered slightly better.

Vue vs React: Popularity

React clearly won this battle. It’s not surprising that it has a bigger community and popularity because Facebook stands behind this technology. On Reddit, React community has over 346k users. 

Vue community is a little smaller, with fewer resources and packages, but it is maintained by the creator, Evan You and his team. On Reddit, their community is “only” about 94k.

At the same time, Vue has over 204k stars on GitHub, and React 208k. 

To back up this claim, I prepared some numbers collected from Stack Overflow, stateofjs, and Google Trends. Check them below.

In 2022, React.js was the second most commonly used framework. Vue stayed in sixth place.

Since 2019, Vue slightly outperforms React in terms of interest. 

But React is still the winner if it’s about Usage:

If it’s about the most Loved vs. Dreaded web frameworks, React is 6th, while Vue is 10th. In 2021, React was 4th while Vue was 5th.

But React is still the most wanted web framework by experienced developers. Vue is in third place, while in 2021 it was on the 2nd.

Google Trends: Comparison between React vs Vue in the last 12 months

To conclude, React is much more popular and used in the developer community, which means bigger support and more ready-to-go solutions. 

Performance

If you want to make a decision based on performance, I have to disappoint you – both React and Vue.js can be proud of their similar, remarkable speed. However, if you would like to see specific metrics and numbers, you can go there.

Wrap up

Both React and Vue are powerful tools, ready to create complex apps and web solutions. It all depends on your preferences and the project you’re working on.

On the one side, we have Vue, which is smaller and faster, ready to create simpler projects anytime. On the other hand, there’s React, which offers more flexibility for more complex apps. React is also easier to test and more relevant for mobile app development. And you always have huge support behind your back.

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