AngularJS Vs. React

Angular is the JavaScript front-end or client-side framework, and, React is the JS front-end or client-side library built on JavaScript. The comparison between these two is like comparing oranges and apples because one is a framework and another a library.

However, they can be used together or as an alternative to each other, so it’s important to understand the differences between these two.

AngularJS

AngularJS is powered by Google. It was first released on October 20, 2010, and its stable release was on March 18, 2016. AngularJS is considered an enhanced HTML for making a web application. It is an MVC or MVVM-based framework ideally for making single-page applications. It also provides you with two-way data binding for adding interactivity to your code, providing you with a modular approach to doing it.

ReactJS

React is powered by Facebook and Instagram. It was first released on March 2013, and its stable version was released on April 8, 2016. React is considered the most-popular web-view framework in JavaScript. It provides the V (View) from MVC with high performance, reliability, and reusability. It has a concept of virtual DOM. It is perfectly suitable for large-data apps and dynamic content.

Is React killing Angular?

There is a buzz in the tech world that React is killing Angular day by day. Let’s look at what’s really happening.

The main reason for React's success is its high growth rate and popularity. Now developers prefer a small and focused library tied together instead of a huge monolithic framework, which is very hard to maintain. It is up to the user, how he codes and opts for a library or a framework.

On the other side, the scope of React is very limited compared with Angular. Both of them are no-way competitors because Angular provides you with the wider ground for making a production-ready application. For this, Angular has its own ng-react directive i.e., so we can leverage React within AngularJS code.

Angular 2.0 is launching in the coming month and is considered a new web future. The new angular release is now coming with advanced updates and is continuously changing the direction of the web framework.

Strengths of AngularJS

• Built-in extensibility and testability.
• It provides you with a better approach to doing things.
• Its two-way data binding makes it interactive.
• It fulfills all the shortcomings that are encountered in HTML code.
• Angular address the problem that HTML was not designed for dynamic views.
• Adding controls i.e., data-binding, controller, and plain JavaScript make Angularly extensible.
• Angular provides you with services and routing to make a responsive single-page application.

Weaknesses of AngularJS

• It causes performance issues while rendering or updating large blocks of data.
• It has complex data structures.
• Slow as compared to React.
• Google is not using Angular in its own projects.

Strengths of React

• It provides you with a better toolkit and server-side rendering, especially for high-level traffic.
• Server-side rendering makes it really fast
• Very smooth learning curve.
• React Native launched in 2015, enables you to build a world-class, web interactive native look and feel.
• React is a performance-minded ‘View’ rendered approach.

Weaknesses of React

• It is not a full framework, it only focuses on the UI part of the code, leaving behind all other components.
• Like Angular, React doesn’t provide you with modular management libraries or routers.
• The way React Native fixes bugs is not good still, you have to wait for FB to do it or fix it yourself if you can.
• The most annoying part of React is “Flux”, which is more confusing than React.

Conclusion

If you want to build an app with powerful UI, then React would be a better choice for you, and if you really want to build a complex web front-end and need a single modular framework to handle everything, then AngularJS will be an ideal option for you.

Contact us today to get a quote on your angular or ReactJS project.