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Comment by incoming1211 | Hacker News Reader

Huge as in usage? - yes it is huge.

Huge as in the library ecosystem? - yes it is huge.

Huge as in its a massive dependency? - yes it is huge.

I couldn't understand why React was so popular till I read a comment where someone explained that Tailwind and React in a large company allows the 1000s of devs to work in tiny little components without conflicting with others, and all of a sudden it makes sense why people make themselves suffer using React. Then everyone else is just following the large companies because "well X/Y/Z use it so we should too!!!"

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React is 7.4kb minified, add react-dom and you add another 3.6kb - so ~11kb

Htmx is 59.9kb minified.

So it’s not huge in at least one dimension: file size.

https://bundlephobia.com/package/react@19.1.1

https://bundlephobia.com/package/react-dom@19.1.1

https://bundlephobia.com/package/htmx.org@2.0.7

https://bundlephobia.com/package/react-dom@18.3.1 130kb for react-dom 15-18 (would check more but site has rate limited me...)

So, while yes the very latest version of react is *finally* as slim as competitors like preact, don't act like all the legacy projects where a migration is off the table due to time or money just don't exist.

I just created a new vite react project. All it does is render:

function App() { return <div>Hello world</div> }

Publish it as if it would be deployed to prod. ~185kb

Your level of understanding is not very huge. React is an absolute pleasure to use, and we do enjoy it - that is why it became the most popular library and a revolution in web dev.

> Your level of understanding is not very huge

We don't need such comments here.

Why do you speak for someone else? Those "We" are in the same room with us?

The commenter above first couldn't understand, then read some comment, then understood something completely out-of-point throwing a bunch of generalisms touching me like "people make themselves suffer" and "everyone else is just following" and decided to dump it here? I can't just leave it untouched since I have actual experience with React.

"We" as the HN users, expect at least some level of civility when conversing here. It's right up there in the guidelines:

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

> Be kind. Don't be snarky. Converse curiously; don't cross-examine. Edit out swipes.

> Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive.

> When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. "That is idiotic; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3."

Try to argue without being personal.

Tell me then does this kind of comment fits those guidelines or welcome here?

>miroljub 3 hours ago | parent | next [–]

>We don't need such comments here.

Is it kind? Is it curious? Thoughtful? Substantive?

In fact it contradicts guidelines, as they encourage downvoting without explanation in order to not clutter the thread. They were trying to explain to you, whereas most readers will sinply downvote. Yes, I think they meant that as a kindness.

Do you think people criticizing React do without experience? How naivy.

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