Guess I missed that. That makes sense, it's an interesting trade-off though. I suspect that including Vue via a script tag is not how the majority of users implement Vue; and therefore clinging to the virtual DOM may be a net-negative for most use cases. Personally, I am using Vue for a data-intensive app where performance really really matters. Although, I understand how broadening access to the framework increases availability and adoption; and for most use cases these performance considerations don't have any real world implications.

It is interesting though looking across benchmarks though and seeing non virtual DOM frameworks crushing their counterparts in terms of speed. I wonder if we'll see more growth in that space in the future.