Although there are some similarities in how they work, Google and Facebook are very different technologies. Angular is a toolkit, while React is a library. Angular developers prefer two-way data binding, while React developers prefer unidirectional data flow. Explore the differences between these two technologies to determine which is best for your larger project.
What is React?
What does it mean? React is an open-source JavaScript library that Facebook created to simplify front-end development. It's component-based, easy to learn, and open-source. React is today the most popular UI tool for developers. React is built around components. Each component can be combined to create a complex interface. Components are rendered according to the data they receive. Debugging React components becomes much easier when you adopt a declarative approach.
React's use of virtual DOM instead of the real DOM is one of its most important features. Virtual DOM allows the webpage not to render all components every time a change is made. The only thing it needs to do is update the components affected by the changes. React can perform well, especially on complex UI.
React can also reduce the time it takes to develop a project requirement. React allows developers to reuse and build components instead of starting from scratch. React is easy to learn as it's built on JavaScript. Most developers are already familiar with this programming language.
What is Angular?
Google created Angular. It was first launched in 2010 under the name AngularJS, but it has been redesigned as Angular 2 since then. Angular Two was rewritten to fix many of the flaws found in previous versions. In this article, we will refer to Angular 2 as Angular. Angular uses Typescript and is structured around components. Each component in angular consists of two components: a template and a type. The business logic is contained in the template, while the class determines the object's view layer.
Angular inherits its predecessor's dependency injection system, which has been revised. This allows components to use dependencies without having to hardcode them. Inter-component communication can be made easy by adding value to the input or output properties of components. Angular is a complete framework that offers a rich ecosystem of design tools and a variety of ways to use them. It is one of the most popular UI frameworks, and a vibrant user community supports it.
Market Trends
You can understand the battle between Angular and React by comparing their adaptations. React had more than 10,000,000 downloads over the last six months. On the other hand, Angular has been downloaded more than 2.1 million times in the same period.
React's popularity is evident by the huge gap between Angular and React. Does this mean that you should choose React for UI development over Angular? You'll get a better understanding after comparing the key features of both technologies.
What is the Difference Between Angular and React?
It would be easy to dismiss the differences between Angular vs. React as a difference in frameworks and libraries. However, most software developers who use React to create a view library also use other libraries within the React ecosystem. React is often grouped with other JavaScript Frameworks like Angular or Vue.js. It's essential to dig into the details to understand the differences truly.
Angular is an advanced JavaScript framework written using TypeScript, a superset of JavaScript. Angular Two was first released in 2016 by Google as AngularJS. It's a complete rewrite. The new Angular framework was created to compete with React. It embraces components while retaining dependency injection (DI) and two-way data bind features that Angular developers have come to love.
Standard features of Angular include
- TypeScript
- CLI Angular
- Dependency injection
- Data binding in two directions
- Routing using @angular/router
- Forms using @angular/forms
- Protection against XSS
- HTML Templates
- Component CSS encapsulation
React (React.js) was released as an open-source JavaScript library for rendering views in 2013. React only provides the view. Unlike the old AngularJS, which provided the model, the view, and the controller, React only provides the view. React popularized components-based architecture in web and mobile development. App Developers could choose how to manage the state using other frameworks and libraries. React chose to manage state with libraries that encourage working with immutable and one-way data to achieve the unidirectional data flow.
React includes the following standard features:
- Virtual DOM (Document Object Model)
- JSX files
- Protection against XSS
- Functional components
- Basic state management using setState and the Context API
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Here Is A List Of The Major Differences Between Angular Vs. React
Componentization
Componentization is a web development technique that isolates front-end features in encapsulated modules. These components are then easier to test, deploy and modify without affecting the rest of the application. Componentization helps separate concerns when splitting projects between multiple developers. It makes it easier for an application to scale and adapt to changing market demands.
React was the first to introduce components-based web application development in 2013. It demonstrated that you could use a components architecture on mobile apps and websites at scale. Components gave React a competitive edge over AngularJS, which still followed the traditional MVC approach (model, view, and controller) to web development. Google was compelled to rework AngularJS to Angular 2 because the performance difference was too great to ignore.
Both React and Angular today are component-based. UI components encapsulate logic for front-end features like sign-in forms and text inputs. These UI components are easily repurposed for different pages and apps with different data and styles.
They differ in the way they achieve componentization. Components are decorators in the Angular universe (@component), which allow a directive, service, or filter to be customized before usage. They let us know if a particular class is a component or module, and they pull together the metadata to determine what a view should look like.
Components in React are JSX files that contain both JavaScript code and HTML template content. These components can either be pure functions or class-based, depending on what the developer needs. Props can also be passed unidirectionally through components.
Data Binding
Data binding is a mechanism that connects the data model with the view or user interface. There has been a lot of discussion about the benefits of two-way (Angular) and one-way (React) data binding. You can do both with Angular or React. Angular comes with two-way data binding by default. React requires you to select the appropriate state management library.
Data flows from the model directly to the view in a one-way data binding. Unidirectional data flows have the advantage that they make it easier to manage your application's state. You are aware that changes to the state of a component will only affect the components below. All changes to the component's state will not affect its siblings or parent components. Data flows between the model and the view in two-way data linking.
The model will be updated if the view is changed. Two-way data binding has the primary advantage of quick updates, making data management for developers easier (you can be sure your view and model are in sync). The performance costs of this convenience are high. As applications become more complex and larger, the number of watchers will increase.
Performance
Angular 2 and React were neck-and-neck performance benchmarks until the release of Angular 2 2016. Most general metrics are comparable in terms of performance. React, and Angular can sometimes be the winner, depending on which version or test is used. In task-based benchmark tests, Angular is usually the winner.
When you compare the overall load time of a site, React has an edge. It makes sense because React loads specific webpage parts efficiently using a virtual DOM, while Angular manipulates DOM directly. This performance advantage is most noticeable when a page must update multiple views simultaneously, such as the image and video galleries in social media apps Facebook and Instagram.
Performance should not be the primary factor in choosing between React and Angular. Both technologies are front-end JavaScript top-tiers that can be utilized to create performant mobile app development and websites. If performance is an issue, specific architecture choices will be more important.
Development Experience and Learning Curve
React may be the easiest JavaScript framework to learn, as all you need is HTML and JavaScript to start. After you become familiar with JSX files, building an app using encapsulated components is easier. You can then add libraries to your app to include missing features. TypeScript is required to use Angular and the Angular commands and patterns.
However, Some would argue that Angular's "batteries-included" approach, it is excellent Angular CLI and uniform documentation, and the less fragmented ecosystem makes learning easier.
Personal preference and experience are the main factors determining which framework is easiest for a developer. Large and active communities on GitHub and Stack Overflow support both JavaScript frameworks. React is a library and, therefore, easier to learn as a new tech.
Bundle Size
If you want your website to rank high on search engines, then the bundle size is important. The bundle size affects loading time, which is an important ranking factor for Google. Angular tries its best to reduce the bundle size.
When building an app, it removes all non-essential components and development utilities. Reach also breaks down code into smaller segments and removes modules that are not needed. It performs dynamic imports during the build. Which approach produces the smaller bundle? React is the clear winner since it produces a smaller web file than Angular.
Scalability
Remember that your web app or website may grow in the future. Both Angular & React have their way of handling this. Angular is a complete framework that provides all the features and tools you need to extend your app. It's possible to build a scalable app if you use React. React integrates with a variety of third-party tools.
React vs. Angular: Mobile development
There are two ways to create mobile apps using Angular and React.
- You can create a hybrid application by integrating it with a framework like Ionic. You create an Angular or React application hosted within a native WebView component (wrapper).
- Create a compiled application by integrating it with a framework, such as React Native (for Angular) or NativeScript. Create an app that uses UI components to compile code in the native device language.
Performance and programmer productivity are the trade-offs between hybrid apps and compile apps. It is easier to create a hybrid app because it's essentially a web application that you port to mobile. It is possible to achieve near-native performance with compiled apps. Still, you must adapt your web application code to the framework.
NativeScript and React Native are compiled app frameworks that provide libraries of pre-built elements you can use for your mobile apps. This can simplify the process. React Native with NativeScript, and Angular can achieve 60 fps on iOS and Android. Choose the framework that best suits your current workflow.
Read More: 5 Web Development Techniques Every Beginner Must Know
Recap - Pros and Cons of React vs. Angular
Here's a quick recap of the pros and cons of using Angular or React.
The Advantages of Angular
- Functionality Right Out of the Box: You get all of the bells, whistles, and bells of a fully-fledged MVVM Framework, including dependency injection.
- Dependency Injection: DI simplifies the testing of individual components. DI makes it easier to manage dependencies and saves you time when developing larger applications. Angular is popular among large enterprise applications.
- Consistency: Angular developers are more opinionated and consistent than React developers.
- Productivity: Angular provides you with everything you need to create SPAs. You don't need to look for libraries to get started.
- Typescript: allows you to use functional programming and avoid errors using JavaScript with static type checking.
- Angular-Language-Service: Adds programming productivity features to your IDE (integrated development environment), including auto-completion, error checking, and AOT diagnostic messages.
- MVVM (Model-View-ViewModel): Angular supports MVVM, which allows you to place view logic on the client side of your application in the ViewModel. This separation of concerns makes certain scenarios easier to maintain.
The Disadvantages of Angular
- Learning Curve Steep: Not only must you learn TypeScript but also how to build applications using Angular: scopes, DI factories, services, and modules.
- Difficulty Scaling: While two-way data binding works well for smaller apps, it becomes more difficult to manage the state of your app as your app grows and side effects pile up.
- Debugging Scopes: While easy to implement, they are difficult to debug. It becomes harder to track all of the scopes in your application as your app grows. The bidirectional data flow makes this even more difficult.
- Larger File Sizes: As a front-end framework, it is worth considering if those features are needed, and Angular will only add to the complexity of your application.
- SEO Disadvantages: It's a common misconception that Angular harms SEO. It depends more on your choice of framework than on the way you render your website. This problem is solved by server-side rendering. Google recommends dynamic rendering when client-side web apps are heavy. Search engine crawlers will receive their server-rendered content whenever they visit a site.
The Advantages of React
- Flexibility: React provides the view layer but leaves it to you to choose what state management and router system to use.
- Virtual DOM: Changes to a data representation of the DOM can be made only to update the needed parts (rather than updating the whole page).
- Functional Components: Isolate the state management from the component to create pure functions.
- Component Reuse: React's mix of functional and class components allows you to reuse components flexibly.
- Downward Data Flow: Simplify State Management in Applications that Require Heavy DOM Manipulation with One-Way Data Binding.
- A Vibrant Community: An enthusiastic community of open-source developers and projects that offers libraries and tools to meet your mobile or web development needs.
- React Developer Tools: A Chrome DevTools Extension allows you to inspect the hierarchies for React components on a website.
The Disadvantages of React
- Fragmented Documentation: The documentation is decentralized because React Developers use an ecosystem of libraries instead of a framework. It's also harder to master.
- Rapid Development Pace: This can be an advantage depending on your perspective. React's modularity allows you to use different versions of React components within the same application. This allows you to maintain a high uptime by not updating your entire application when certain libraries are updated. It's also tempting to accumulate technical debt, which can lead to bugs in the future.
- No Conventions: React the developer with a lot more flexibility. There are many different ways to achieve the same result within the React ecosystem, depending on your library. The need for conventions in React can pose a challenge for new developers.
- SEO Disadvantages: As with Angular, React is also flagged as having SEO issues that can be resolved through server-side or dynamic rendering. It's not the framework that matters but how your website is designed to be indexed and accessed by search engine spiders.
Which is Better, React or Angular?
Angular is a component-based framework that supports both data binding and rendering. Both have similar performance and learning curves.
The State Management Philosophy is the Real Difference between Angular & React
The state of an application at any given time is an abstraction. In front-end design and graphical user interfaces, we are particularly concerned with the state of an app about user inputs and their history. React's state management is based on a unified data flow with functional components. The state is unchangeable, and your data model is the only source of truth. A JSX file contains the HTML, and JavaScript required to describe a UI element.
Angular manages the state via dependency management and variable scope. Mutations are encouraged and allowed. Angular relies on TypeScript for code safety and two-way data binding to increase programmer productivity. Components can comprise multiple files but are encapsulated by the component decorator. Because two-way data binding comes as standard, dependency injection becomes necessary to track all of those dependencies.
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Conclusion
React is the best option if
You may be a visual person (DOM manipulation), value creativity and flexibility, or prefer functional programming with unidirectional data flow. Redux and React native are especially helpful for those who wish to benefit from the immutable nature of pure functions. Pure functions will always produce the same output if given the same input. This immutability is designed to eliminate side effects. It can be a great help when testing and debugging complex DOM trees.
Use Angular if
Consistency, reactivity, and a stable release schedule are all important. Angular is often used in enterprise app development. Angular has all the bells, whistles, and features needed to create a fully functional web app. It also helps developers understand best practices to make hiring new talent easier or collaborating remotely. Angular dependency injection makes it easy to separate components for testing and mocking. Both frameworks can build modern web and mobile applications using component-based architectures. Select the framework that suits your preferred programming model and project workflow.
