Are React client components bad?
React client components have been a topic of debate among developers. Some argue that they are bad for front-end development, while others believe they are beneficial for building scalable and maintainable web applications. Let’s explore both perspectives in this article.
Pros of React client components
- Reusability: React components allow developers to create reusable UI elements, which can be used across different parts of the application. This saves time and effort in writing and maintaining code.
- Modularity: Components in React are modular, meaning they can be easily combined and reused to build complex user interfaces. This promotes code organization and makes it easier to understand and maintain the codebase.
- Performance: React’s virtual DOM and efficient reconciliation algorithm help improve the performance of web applications, especially those with large and dynamic UIs.
- Community support: React has a large and active community, which means developers have access to a wide range of libraries, tools, and resources for building client components.
Cons of React client components
- Learning curve: React has a steep learning curve, which can be challenging for beginners and developers coming from other front-end frameworks.
- Tooling and setup: Setting up a React project with the right tooling and configuration can be time-consuming and complex, especially for smaller projects or teams with limited resources.
- JSX and declarative syntax: Some developers find it difficult to grasp JSX and React’s declarative syntax, especially if they are used to imperative programming styles.
- Abstraction: React’s components can add layers of abstraction, making it harder to debug and troubleshoot issues in the UI.
Conclusion
In conclusion, whether React client components are “bad” ultimately depends on the specific needs and context of a project. While they offer several benefits in terms of reusability, modularity, and performance, they also come with challenges such as a steep learning curve and potential abstraction overhead. It’s essential for developers to carefully evaluate the trade-offs and consider factors such as project size, team expertise, and long-term maintainability when deciding whether to use React client components for front-end development.
Not the main objective of the video, but thanks to showing me how to mark a file has client side
Does caching in the new router only works when deploying on Vercel? Because this seems to be the case with the old getServerSideProps, which also has caching, which seems to only work when deploying to Vercel.
I wonder every time I want to detect the active state on a Navigation component, I have to make it client-side, right? Is there any way I can calculate the active state without turning it into a client component?
nextjs 14: middleware components 😂
Thank you
I had difficulty grasping the distinctions between server and client components, as I was under the impression that a server component could not be contained within a client component. This created confusion, as my user profile button required server functionality to access the user database, while being nested within an animating sidebar that needed client-side abilities. However, the solution was to pass it as a child or prop instead of directly importing it.
Once I experimented with this method, everything made sense and functioned seamlessly
how do you test these components?
if people think client components are bad, then how can they access window object ?😅😅
I like how this video acknowledges the fact that React and RSCs could exist outside of Nextjs. Oh, wait, it didn't 😅
well explained sir lee robinson!
yes
Is the pages router will be deprecated? should i start migrating to app/
The best use case for server components is to limit javascript being sent to the client. The problem is, most third party libraries use hooks so you end up making most component as client component. It looks like astro does it better. Qwik offers an entirely different approach fully ditching hydration and the end result is even better than astro.
Waiting to see Storybook and SCSS to work together in Nextjs
I love how Sveltekit doc puts it right – "If you have a secret (env) you probably shouldn't expose on client, or you want to fetch data before client spins up – then use server"
All other UI interactions are for client.
I am using axios for data fetching but getting re-renders errors in server pages and components
Like the new app router, just struggling with using the metadata api with client components in the app router
I keep getting told that I am not allowed to use it in a client component
Should I go back to using a Head component
It still didn't answer the question when to use server and client components.
And the answer is use server components for the data which absolutely has to be included in the initial HTML (most of the time it means SEO-related data) and client for the rest.
This video is 4 minutes and 20 seconds long
That has to be on purpose right
Make client component the default