Most popular JavaScript frameworks in 2016
In this modern web JavaScript is the most popular language in the web to building the web application. There are many different ways to build modern web application with JavaScript, including a lot of different tool choices, and a lot of new theory to learn.Using the JavaScript we can easily extend the functionalities and logical executions of the component.
Most of the developer are used JQuery along with JavaScript to extend the features of HTML component,but when we talk about the large application it requires more effort and complex in code to develop and the maintain a large application. JavaScript Frameworks help to build fast,interactive and scalable web applications (which includes both single page and multiple page applications).
But, unfortunately! Most programmers find it hard to decide which framework they use and learn. Thus, in this article, I am going to highlight the 7 most popular JavaScript Frameworks in 2016. Let’s get started!
7 most popular JavaScript Frameworks in 2016
1. AngularJS
When we talked about javascript frameworks the first word comes in our mind is that AngularJS. AngularJS, as this is the most commonly used JavaScript Framework by javascript developers. It released in 2009, javaScript based open-source front-end framework to create web application or SPA (Single page application) mainly maintained by Google.
It supports the MVC (Model–view–controller),MVVM (Modal-view-ViewModal) and MVW (Modal-View-Whatever) design paradigm which supports standard two-way data binding. In MVW, whatever stands for “whatever works for you”. Angular gives you the lot of flexibility to separate presentation logic from business logic and presentation state. In MVC, your data is updated on both the UI (presentation state) and back-end (coding or server side) whenever it detects some changes in the engine.
As the UI components (View) are separated from the Model components, you can easily build reusable components for amazing and user-interfaces!
Recently Angular 2.0 has been released in OCT 2016, which claims to improve the speed & performance of mobile and desktop and take it further via web workers and server-side rendering. Meet huge data requirements by building data models on RxJS, Immutable.js or another push-model. Angular Loved by Millions of developers across the globe and it’s highly recommended for anyone who wants a powerful MVC framework with a strong and modern infrastructure that takes care of everything for you to build single page applications.
Angular is also planning to release Angular 4.0 then it called ‘Angular’
Video: See the announcement yourself
(Note: This is my personal favorite JavaScript Framework till date)
2. React
React (sometimes styled React.js or ReactJS) is an open-source JavaScript library which provides a view for data rendered as HTML. Components have been used typically to render React views which contain additional components specified as custom HTML tags. React gives you a trivial virtual DOM, powerful views without templates, unidirectional data flow and explicit mutation. It is very methodical in updating the HTML document when data changes; and a clean separation between components on a modern single-page application. React also support sever-side rendering with with nodejs
As your app comes into existence and develops, it’s advantageous to ensure that your components are used in right manner and React app consists of Reusable components, which makes code reuse, testing, and separation of concerns easy.
ReactJS is not only “V” in MVC, it has stateful components, it handles mapping from input to state changes, and it renders components. I would highly recommend this Framework if you just need a front-end development Framework to build an incredibly complex and awesome UI through the power View Layers. In this sense, it does everything that an MVC does.
Apart from Facebook and Instagram, there are several companies that use React, including Whatsapp, BBC, PayPal, Netflix, Dropbox, etc.
3. Ember
Ember.js is open-source javascript frameworks like angular and react. Initially it released in 2011, 5 year ago. It has a huge active community online, so whenever you face any problem, you can ask them.
Ember.js is based on Model–view–viewmodel (MVVM) design pattern, which is slightly different than MVC, In the sense that the view model is more than view and handles most if not all of the view’s display logic
For the fast server-side rendering with nodejs and adding the animation in UI. we need to use Ember CLI addon Fastboot.js and liquid-fire.js, so the applications have extremely enhanced performance of complex UI with animation.
Ember supports Handlebars integrated templates that update the data changes automatically. It also provides routes, dependency injection, declarative two-way data binding and Custom components.
In 2015, Ember was best JavaScript Framework, competing against AngularJS and React, which should be enough to convince you about its usability and desirability in the JavaScript framework,there are several big companies who’s using ember.js Yahoo!, Zendesk, GROUPON, Yapp, MHElabs, TILDE.
I have not worked much in ember.js but as per my knowledge i would highly recommended this JavaScript Framework to those who don’t necessarily need great flexibility or a large infrastructure, and just prefer to get things done for coping with deadlines.
4. Knockout.js
This JavaScript framework was initially released by Steve Sanderson in 2010 as open source under MIT license. Knockout works under the MVVM design paradigm and that makes it a little different from Ember and Angular.
Knockout has no dependencies on any other libraries and it supports all mainstream browsers like IE 6+, Firefox 3.5+, Chrome, Opera, Safari (desktop/mobile) it’s not popular as much competitors like Angular, Ember or Backbone. The slow growth is simply because of improvements and adding more features in framework.
Developer community is slowly moving to frameworks like React and Angular. Knockout has a great capability and can definitely make a come back but only if someone else adopts it and starts improvement it with the latest web JavaScript technologies.
You can read more about Knockout at knockoutjs.com.
5. Meteor.js
If you LOVE developing the website in pure javascript then MeteorJS is for you. It’s the full stack platform for building modern end to end mobile and web applications completely in JavaScript, for all environments: Application server, Web browser, and Mobile device.
Meteor is the child of Meteor Development Group, it was first released in 2012 as an open source JavaScript framework under MIT license.
Ever since its release, the MeteorJS community too is vibrant and helpful. You would find tons of resources, tutorials and custom packages that give super powers to solve your development errors and develop your app in MeteorJS.
The best thing about MeteorJS is that you use only JavaScript for front-end and backend application development, no need to invest time learning anything else.
The server side packages run in the node.js and you do not need do anything else but MeteorJS packages to access the database, all in JavaScript, this makes developer life easy for building real time web applications.
From Performance perspective, any changes in the database are reflected back on the UI in the real time and vice versa without the handshake between different languages with minimal development efforts.
You can read more about Meteor at – meteor.com.
6. Vue.js
Vue.js is another open-source JavaScript framework was released in 2014. It supports extremely simple API for developing the Reactive components for Modern Web Interfaces Like Ember, it also uses the Model–view–viewmodel (MVVM) design paradigm which helpes in the simplification of the design.
The most important feature in this framework is that you can use selective modules with it for your specific needs. For example, you need to write HTML code, fetch the JSON and create a Vue instance to create the small effects that can reused!
Similar like others JavaScript Frameworks, it also uses two-way data binding to update the model and view, plus it also uses binder for communication between the view and data binder. If you thinking that is full-fledged framework to focus on it then I must say it’s not like what you thinking because it’s focuses entirely on the View Layer, so you would need to take care of other components on your own or you can use any other framework with them.
If you are familiar with AngularJS, then you will feel comfortable with this too, as it heavily incorporates the architecture of AngularJS, so many projects can be easily transferred to this Framework if you know the basics of JavaScript.
As I didn’t get chance to work with that but if you just want to get things done or gain JavaScript programming experience, or if you need to learn the nature of different JavaScript Frameworks you should try this.
7. Backbone.js
This framework can be easily integrated to any third-party template engine, however, by default it has dependancy on Underscore templates along with JQuery, It has the RESTful JSON interface with the support of MVC (Model–view–controller) design pattern.
If you ever heard or used the famous social news networking service reddit, then you will be interested to hear that it uses the Backbone.js for several of its single-page applications. Jeremy Ashkenas who developed the Backbone.js, it has also created the Underscore templates as well as CoffeScript, so you are assured that the developer knows his stuff.
This framework provides models with key-value, views and several modules within a single bundle, so you don’t need to download the other external packages, saving you time. The source-code is available on Github, which means you can further modify it for your needs. There are several big companies who’s using backbone.js 500px Web, Airbnb, Pinterest, Reddit, WordPress.com, USA Today.com,LinkedIn Mobile.
Conclusion
So, I have just highlighted the 7 most popular JavaScript Frameworks in this article in the hopes that it will help you choose the best JavaScript Framework for your tasks.
If you’re still having trouble to choose the best JavaScript Framework for your learning or build web application for your project, then please understand the project requirement and client expectations; and if it doesn’t then just try the next one. Rest assured though that any Framework from the list will be good enough.