React is one of the best-known and most widely used front-end JavaScript frameworks for creating web applications. But what is React exactly? React is often compared to Angular or VueJs in terms of performance, speed, and user-friendliness. Unlike these frameworks, React is a component library for JavaScript. Originally developed by Facebook in 2013 as a way of modularising and optimizing the UI/UX for their web application, React now offers a wide range of options for developing secure, intuitive, and efficient web applications.
Working in a bespoke software development company experienced in React projects, I see the high demand client companies have towards using React for web development. In contrast to Angular, React as a library does not offer typical functions of a framework such as HTTP queries, dependency injection, internationalization, or form validation. Nevertheless, React is flexible enough in terms of its component approach to enable all these functions and more through specific libraries. Below, we explore five of the most crucial benefits of React web development.
1. React State Management
One of the core strengths of React is its ability to manage the state of a web application, meaning the current state of the application. For example, if you call up a website in the browser, the page starts with an initial state. You might then click on the website and a menu will pop up once the menu is expanded, the website is in a new state. You might then click a “Like” button, which puts the application in another state as the number of likes is updated.
You can often do a whole range of other things on a website. Each of them means a separate state. Orchestrating the behavior of the individual components, for example in a duplicate of the React app built with vanilla JavaScript, in such a way that all possible actions are correctly mapped in their respective state is complicated – you remember: A separate page would be needed for each possible view, on which each component is told individually how it has to behave. React also introduced Hooks – a new addition from the introduction of React 16.08 version. The hooks concept allows you to use state and other React functions without writing classes for them.
2. React is Declarative
React is declarative – the program logic aims at how something should look like. React stores a core truth that is propagated to all components. Components in React are built to reflect state. When you click the Like button in a single-page app built with React, the counter knows what number to display. Also, as long as each component is rendered considering the same state, React automatically knows how to visualize the rest of the page. On the other hand, imperative logic aims to tell the application what to do exactly. To illustrate this in natural language, declarative logic is like saying to your roommate, “We need dishwasher liquid.”
In contrast, you tell him the steps to be performed in an imperative syntax: “Get out, take some money with you, visit the supermarket and buy dishwasher liquid” Both work, but the second one is far longer, more complicated, and thus more error-prone. Declarative code is usually easier to debug because it’s easier to see what the code is trying to do, while many lines of imperative code often take you longer to understand what it’s trying to accomplish.
3. Reusability and Flexibility
Just like Angular, React uses a component method for development that allows you to build scalable and flexible web applications. But what exactly are React components? Components allow you to break your user interface (UI) into independent, reusable chunks and view each piece separately. Generally, React components are JavaScript functions or classes (since ES6) with a render() method. For example, the Material UI framework offers a rich base of ready-to-use React components and modules that are in perfect synergy with the ReactJS library.
If we take a closer look at the React API, we can check the component status at every single moment. The above React API components are designed for the functional approach. The components are divided into classes so that they can be easily transferred, extended, and scaled. In addition, the core functionalities of React are significantly extended by libraries such as Redux or Flux. Finding an experienced ReactJS development company ensures that your project will be implemented quickly and successfully by trusted professionals.
4. React’s Virtual DOM
Performance is the biggest challenge of contemporary dynamic web applications and front-end developers always seek ways to tackle this challenge. However, React has found an ingenuine solution to the performance issue – its virtual DOM (Document Object Model). React’s DOM is set up in the browser and stores all elements, no matter how small, in a tree structure in order to then carry out various operations, e.g. calculating positions or properties such as color, size, etc. If the DOM or one of its properties is to be changed, the DOM must be recalculated.
In typical cases, jQuery is used for this, which executes the operations via the browser DOM. Since the elements can influence each other in many different ways, these changes and calculations are quite complex. In React, the Virtual DOM solves this problem by storing the DOM in memory and performing selective updates, so that necessary changes occur quickly and the number of updates in the browser is reduced.
5. React is SEO-Friendly
Another distinguished benefit of React web development apart from its fast rendering, reusable components, and unidirectional data flow of this front-end JavaScript library, is its SEO-friendliness. React offers the ability to deal with a common search engine error when reading heavy JavaScript-based applications. It is designed so that React can run on the server, render and return the virtual DOM to the browser as a normal web page.
Each business executive is aware that Google rankings and a seamless UX web platform should be top priorities to keep one step ahead of the competition. In our fast-paced world, web applications with slow response times lose platform users within a seconds after the initial interaction. Investing in React web development guarantees that your next web application will be fully equipped with the latest web capabilities and rank higher in search engines!
Author Biography Aleksandrina Vasileva
Aleksandrina is a Content Creator at Dreamix, a custom software development company, and is keen on innovative technological solutions with a positive impact on our world. Her teaching background mixed with her interest in psychology drives her to share knowledge. She is an avid reader and enthusiastic blogger, always looking for the next inspiration.