Angular vs React vs Vue: Which is the Best Choice for 2019-20?

In 2019-20, it is impractical to imagine web development without HTML, CSS, and Javascript. Javascript is the soul of the front-end development of web apps.
If you have landed on this page, I assume that you are confused between
the different frameworks & libraries of Javascript programming
language.

Some of the most common queries of businesses as well as software developers are:

• Angular or React or Vue: Which is better for my next web app development project?
• Which Javascript framework or library offers the best performance?
• Which is the most suitable for my small web application?
• Which of the three Javascript frameworks/libraries is the most reliable one?
• Which framework/ library is suitable for small size or large size applications?

At the end of the blog, you will be able to decide which among Angular vs
React vs Vue is the most suitable programming tool for your project. So
let’s dive into the comparison of these three Javascript frameworks
& libraries to choose the best one in 2019!

1. Angular vs React vs Vue: Popularity (According to stack overflow, npm and Google Trends)

Summary:

React is more popular according to stack overflow statistics and google trends.

The user interface frameworks and libraries of Javascript programming
language work in a cycle. After every six months, they change positions
and a new one pops up. React and angular have been popular frameworks from a few past years.

#1 Stat According to the Stack Overflow survey, React.js is the most loved framework, followed by Vue.js.

Undoubtedly, Vue.js has gained remarkable popularity since its launch in 2014. This shift occurred in mid-2016 and is sustained perfectly well in
contemporary times. It is still expected that this framework will rise
more in the coming years.

#2 Stat The story says something else if you look at the search trends from the past 12 months of Google trends.

Have a look at the graph below, Vue.js is way behind angular and react. React is the most popular in searches.

#3 Stat Below is a graphical representation of the npm trends
for the downloads and stars of Angular vs react vs vue. It clearly
shows React on top, followed by angular and then vue. But when we look
at the stars, the lowest goes to angular and highest to vue, followed by
react.

Although it is clear that React is most loved and downloaded framework in 2019, it does not mean that it is the best. There are many other factors that
will decide which framework is the most appropriate one for a particular
type of web development project.

2. Angular vs React vs Vue: An introduction to the background

Before we get into the more specific details about these three Javascript frameworks or libraries, let’s get a brief intro of Angular vs React vs Vue.

Angular:

Released in 2010 by Google. It is a typescript based javascript framework. It
was released prior to the other two Javascript frameworks that we are
discussing in this blog. Today it is called Angular but before 2016
there was a suffix ‘JS’ to its name.

JS was dropped from its name after the release of Angular 2+. 

On 28 May’2019, its latest version, Angular 8.0.0 was released. Google and Wix are among the most popular companies using Angular.

React:

Released in 2013 by Facebook. It is mostly used in high traffic websites. It was developed when Facebook ads started gaining traffic and faced problems in their coding and maintenance which depicted certain issues. Its latest version, 16.8.6 was released on 6 May’2019.

They were resolved with the release of this library of Javascript. 

Whatsapp, Instagram Paypal, Glassdoor, BBC are some of the popular companies using React. It is highly dynamic and offers great support in creating interactive user interfaces.

Vue:

A progressive Javascript framework released in 2014 and developed by no
big name like React and Angular. In fact, it was created by an ex-engineer of Google, Evan You. It is gaining constant popularity. Its latest version; Version 2.6.10 was released on 20 March 2019.

It is the youngest member of the family of Javascript frameworks. It has
practically removed the drawbacks of the other frameworks to offer ease
of next level to software developers. Websites like GitLab and Alibaba
are using Vue.

3. Angular vs React vs Vue: Performance

Summary:

There is a thing called DOM which can be understood as UI, that is the user
interface of your application. The DOM changes whenever you update the
user interface. This represents the changes that are made in the
application.

It can be used in two ways, either as virtual DOM or a real DOM. The performance of the framework/library is highly affected by them. Let’s see what is used by Angular vs React vs Vue 2019 to understand their level of performance:

Angular:

This framework of Javascript uses real DOM. It is extremely hard to handle
because if you lose the flow, you will have to go deep into the codes to
actually find out the issue. It is time-consuming, and risky to attract
a lot of bugs.

The real DOM use by Angular affects its performance and ability to make
dynamic software application. Furthermore, it results in the slow
performance of this Javascript framework.

React:

This Javascript library is using virtual DOM. It is not browser specific and
lightweight. It is provided in react package for free and eliminates
the issues of slow performance of real DOM.

This allowed a significant improvement in the performance of javascript frameworks/ libraries and made React utterly popular.

Vue:

Vue has taken all the good attributes of frameworks launched before it.
With the same concept, Vue is using Virtual DOM as an adopted concept of
React. This ensures faster and bug-free performance.

P.S. Although many developers find problem while working with virtual DOM of React and Vue. They do not find it efficient enough to choose over Real DOM.

4. Angular vs React vs Vue: Top Use Cases

Javascript is embraced by top-notch companies to develop their products. The best software development services are revolving around the Javascript frameworks heavily. These three frameworks and libraries are utilized by various organizations like Google and Facebook.

Let’s have a look at some well-known names that are using Angular vs react vs vue:

Angular:

• It is developed by Google and utilized in its Google AdWords applications

• The Guardian, a leading company in publishing sector

• Weather.com, highly used website for weather forecast around the globe

React:

• It was developed and used for the maintenance and coding of Facebook ad campaigns. Along with some other Facebook products as well.

• Twitter, a globally popular social networking site

• The highly popular and high-traffic messaging app, Whatsapp

• The photo sharing a well-known social media platform, Instagram

Vue:

• 9Gag, social networking site for sharing trending content

• GitLab, a repository manager that allows the team to develop or duplicate code

5. Angular vs React vs Vue: Community Support

Summary:

Angular and React has a strong community base with backing from top companies like Facebook and Google. But still, vue is popular in the open-source community.

Angular:

It was introduced by the renowned market-leader Google. Moreover, the
organization uses this Javascript framework for its Google Adwords
applications. This adds to the authenticity of Angular which provides it
strong community support since its launch.

React:

It was developed by Facebook to support its ad campaigns maintenance and coding. A team of engineers at Facebook are still working on its
improvement. Facebook has coded its several products to React and
invested in it heavily. This is the reason behind the constant growing
reliability of React in the developers’ world.

Vue:

Unlike Angular vs React, Vue is not backed by any top-level corporate. This
should have resulted in lesser popularity but in reality, this
Javascript framework gained amazing popularity in the open source
community.

6. Angular vs React vs Vue: Framework size

Summary:

Vue is the lightest of all. Vue and React are suitable for light-weight application whereas Angular for heavyweight application.

In a nutshell, Angular, Vue, React framework and libraries in a descending order according to their sizes are:

Angular (approximately of 500 KB size)

React (approximately 100 KB size)

Vue (approximately 80 Kb size)

Now let’s understand the impact of these framework sizes on the software development projects of your business:

Angular:

Angular has a lot to offer to its developers from templates to testing
utilities. This obviously needs space which makes it size big. This
makes it unsuitable for the light-weight applications.

React:

It is suitable for light-weight applications as it does not provide much
like Angular. In fact, React is not a framework like Angular. This is
why it needs support from other libraries for tasks like routing and
all.

Vue:

It is the smallest of other frameworks and libraries that we are
discussing in this blog. Hence, extremely suitable for the development
of lightweight applications. If you require a library that is smaller
than Vue then you must choose Preact.

7. Angular vs React vs Vue: Learning curve

Summary:

React is most preferred by developers to use and learn, followed by Vue and then Angular.

The ability of the users to write codes in a particular programming language is known as its learning curve. When it comes to Angular vs react vs Vue then angular takes a backfoot in comparison to the other two.

This is because the Vue and React do not require to hire web developers who are proficient in typescript. But among these two, Vue has an upper hand as it is considered more friendly by the developers.

According to the statistics provided by the Stateofjs research, Vue scored more than angular when the respondents were asked: “used it, would use again”. There were many options given to the developers to choose which were treated as the parameters for comparison.

Here are their parameters and the result of the votes by developers are represented in the graph below:

As you can see, the Vue got the maximum votes for the option of “heard of it, would like to learn.” it clearly shows a bright learning curve for this library of JS in future. Along with this, the graph is a crystal representation of diminishing popularity of Angular.

8. Angular vs React vs Vue: Flexibility

Summary:

Angular- offers everything you need but not much flexible, React- the most flexible, Vue- not much opinionated or flexible.

Angular

It offers everything from routing to templates. You do not have to move to
any other tool to develop your applications. This can be good or bad
according to your perspective.

It has opinions on how to structure an application. You do not get to or
you do not need to select routing libraries. You can just start with the coding process with everything provided in the Angular package.

React

Unlike Angular, it does not provide a lot in the official React library. This
provides you the liberty to choose programming tools of your choice. In
other words, it is not much opinionated like Angular.

The third-party solutions like react routing can be integrated with this javascript framework. Other than this you can also use the MobX and Redux to support the office management tasks.

If you hire best software developers who are well-experienced then they
will enjoy this flexibility a lot. Moreover, you will get an amazing and
dynamic application developed for your business.

Vue

The Vue framework is as bare-bones as react framework. But Vue ecosystem on its official website has a lot to offer to its developers. Some of the add ons are Vue Router for routing and for state management there is Vuex.

It also has a vue server-side render to initiate the server-side development of an application. Hence, it is not as much opinionated as Angular but not as much flexible as React.

Conclusion:

After reading and researching in-depth about Angular, react and Vue, we can conclude these four things:

Vue and React offers better performance and flexibility than Angular.

Vue and react are more suited for light-weight applications and angular is the best for large UI applications.

Angular is highly opinionated and unlike Vue and React, it offers everything
from routing, templates to testing utilities in its package.

Vue is the most popular, loved and growing framework of Javascript.

I hope that after reading this complete comparison of Angular vs React vs
Vue, you are clear about the best suitable Javascript framework /
library for your next software app development project.

I have been working in Xicom Technologies for the last 12 years as a Business Analyst. If you have an idea and still confused about which is a better option between the three then you can contact us offers you with the best website development solutions in India.

You can share any additional information in the comment section (hackernoon community). We can have a healthy discussion to enrich our knowledge base about these flourishing programming tools.