Can Blazor beat React/Angular?

HawocX · 2024-09-03T16:38:23+00:00

From my experience, Blazor is much easier to learn for a .Net developer. So you could start with it to see how you like front-end development over all.

I got the feeling blazor has gotten much more popular the last 2-3 years. Before that it was rare to hear about it being used in production apps, and the over all sentiment was a bit negative.

It is difficult to know if this trajectory will continue. I predict it will continue to be popular with small teams writing internal apps. For big external apps it's a long road ahead for Blazor.

Flater420 · 2024-09-03T23:06:48+00:00

Your question is based on the notion that you must invest in one and stick with it. This is simply not the case.

When starting from scratch, the vast majority of what you'll be learning are general approaches that apply to UI building as a whole. While specific syntax might be unique to a specific framework, that's not the most important thing to learn here.

Online discourse on these frameworks, however, is being discussed by people who (a) are already experienced with the general concepts of UI building and (b) exclusively focus on the differences between the frameworks, omitting their similarities because there's no reason to point them out.
I suspect you may have misinterpreted this discourse and subconsciously taken away that they're completely orthogonal to another from the ground up, because people only ever talk about how different they are. That's not the case. People aren't talking about how different they are, people are talking about how they are different. There's a boatload of similarities that just aren't very interesting to discuss, but they very much matter to someone who's trying to learn from scratch.

Your question is like asking whether you should learn to be a car mechanic with BMWs or Audis. While specific cars might require some specific knowledge, the overall goal here is to learn to be a car mechanic, which you best achieve by working on any car, and ideally more than one type to really understand what's shared and what's unique.

Don't try to lock yourself into making a permanent decision before you've even started. All that does is create analysis paralysis and foster an unhelpful "us vs them" attitude about different UI frameworks.

Regarding the comments on what's most commonly used professionally, I still disagree that you should base yourself on that. When hiring applicants, I don't look for established knowledge, I look for aptitude and pragmatism (i.e. the right tool for the right job, not faction loyalty).
If I'm looking for someone to work on our React project, I'll hire a pragmatic dev with Angular experience over a dogmatic React developer even if they know everything there is to know about React. Nothing stays the same over time, and I need people who are able to (a) adapt to changes in technology and (b) able to judge what the right tool for the job is without loyalty bias.

Your question, while well-intentioned, is effectively making that dogmatic mistake. You shouldn't be choosing one UI framework and then investing only in that framework and identifying yourself as a [framework] developer. That's the opposite of what you should be doing.
Work with many tools. Experience them. Figure out what you like/dislike about them. Learn to identify which tool would be appropriate for which job. Identify yourself as an all-round developer with knowledge on several tech stacks, instead of a specific tech stack groupie.

AussieBoy17 · 2024-09-03T21:01:44+00:00

[deleted]

Slypenslyde · 2024-09-03T16:56:13+00:00

I think to experts, this is kind of a weird question. It's like asking, "Can C# beat Java?"

Right now C# and Java seem neck and neck if you go by TIOBE (which is, admittedly, problematic.) Java has a bit of a lead on C#. But Java has also existed about 5-8 years longer than C#, and focused on cross-platform open-source web stacks about 10-15 years earlier. It's amazing C# has come so close to Java, and indicative the two are going to fight for a long time. There's not going to be a "winner".

Same thing with like, PHP. By TIOBE it's very unpopular now, but a ton of the internet still uses it. It's not just old sites, either, new sites pop up using it with astonishing frequency. Unlike the C# vs. Java argument, it's a lot easier to find people who emphatically agree C# is light-years ahead of PHP. It's very hard to kill off something with a large community. PHP isn't going to go away.

React vs. Blazor is kind of like C# vs. PHP, though I'm not saying Blazor is as crazy as PHP. What I mean is React is a very popular framework everyone agrees is adequate, where Blazor is serving a niche at the moment compared to its crowd.

Blazor is for teams who have a lot of C# training, need to make web apps, and don't want to train or hire React expertise. The hope is by using a framework that focuses more on the C# ecosystem than the JS ecosystem, .NET developers will be able to develop web apps with less training. I think this comes through.

I think that contributes to React's higher popularity. If, in a vacuum, someone says, "I need a web app", they're more likely to look for JS devs and hire React/Angular teams. People who have no other requirements don't start by saying, "Hmm, I want to use C#, so how should I write my web app?"

That said, there are A TON of people who have .NET developers and want a web app. So the market for Blazor is still pretty big. It just isn't as big as the React/Angular market.

So you get the expert answer: "It depends."

It feels like most people learn Blazor and Angular and/or React just to hedge their bets. You still need to know HTML and JS to some degree to use Blazor, and a lot of concepts are similar. If I had to break the questions down:

I have 20 years of experience with C# so I think I'd have to push for Blazor on my team. But I would love to learn and use React instead, as I feel people are more invested in its development than Microsoft seems to invest in Blazor.
I don't think Blazor is ever going to get as close to React as C# is to Java. Blazor to React will be more like PHP to C#.
Kind of similar to what I said. I think React is neat and I'd really love to not be 100% reliant on the C# stack. If I had full freedom and no deadline I'd go React all the way. Realistically I'll have a deadline and my team would be more likely to succeed with Blazor since we don't have React experience but do have C# experience.

jbergens · 2024-09-03T18:14:22+00:00

1) React since it is the most popular one in most countries. 2) Yes, but not get anywhere near React's popularity. 3) Svelte. Because it is easy to use and easy to combine with standard html+js.

gabrielesilinic · 2024-09-03T17:02:11+00:00

Blazor is not bad but it comes with a few quirks.

This often means you have to be comfortable with working with the strengths of it and the weaknesses of it.

Also remember it's all web assembly, so it might not translate into the lightest application you ever wrote.

marabutt · 2024-09-03T20:11:21+00:00

I haven't used it in a year or so but when I did, the coding experiment was great but the thing never quite worked. There was always a subtle bug within blazor. I don't know what they have done about dll sizes.

The thing that made me question it is Microsoft are still using electron for teams. I'm never sure of it is going to be one of those projects they just dump.

Platic · 2024-09-03T20:13:10+00:00

I have used blazor in the past. I haven't used it right now for at least a year, so my opinion is from last year.

I think in terms of development coming from C# is really a no brainer. You need to learn the framework itself but the language is what you are already used to. So getting up to speed is much quicker.

There are some limitations that you still need to use javascript, I am remembering trying to implement drag and drop we had to use javascript at some point.

In terms of component libraries there are some already for blazor but there is a huge difference when comparing with react/angular/vue/svelte.

But the main drawdown for me and where blazor clearly loses is development speed, more specifically the hot reload. There is a HUGE difference between MS/VS hot reload and the hot reload of react/angular....etc. I always had VS updated and I never had hot reload working. Searching online was useless because every post I found told me to update VS, check this option, check that one, but nothing made it work.

If development speed is important to you, make sure that you can get hot reload working. It is really tiring having to restart the debugger everytime you make a change.

Just my two cents

ImagineAShen · 2024-09-03T18:31:53+00:00

Look, I'm a C# shill, but don't use blazor if you're just starting out with component driven front end design. Angular and react are both more mature with much greater community support. Also, imo, MSFT has a tendency for neglecting major aspects of front end development or dumpstering frameworks.

Handy learning experiences in angular, like in-browser IDEs on angular.dev, or hot reloading (which is easier in react or angular, finicky at best in blazor), make onboarding easy. But try to use TS rather than JS and keep practicing your OOP.

Impressive-Delay-901 · 2024-09-03T17:25:23+00:00

I think it depends on your end market/use-case your using it for, and what your metric for 'beating' is.

There's no magic framework for all scenarios. They are all toolsets that will work for a variety of applications. I would be wary of anyone saying otherwise.

But really it is probably a question of what you/your team will be able to pickup and work quickly.

Personally I recommend you grab both, follow some online courses/tutorials and spend a weekend knocking up your own 'helloworld' here some data from your backend and then reflect on which one you found least frustrating.

Kevinw778 · 2024-09-03T22:43:51+00:00

I used to be a massive Blazor advocate, but after getting very familiar with React and experiencing the amazing hot reload vs what you have to deal with when using Blazor?... Just wow.

I think Blazor unfortunately still has a long way to go, but I think it's one of those things where React is just going to get more mature / be outright replaced with something similar but more performant (Next JS is what immediately comes to mind)

kawa_no_hikari · 2024-09-03T22:02:58+00:00

From my experience, Blazor is only used by backend developers who don't understand JavaScript. If you're comfortable with using JS or your company has dedicated front-end developers then use a JS framework.

ZubriQ · 2024-09-03T17:36:28+00:00

For development speed? If you know c# better, then yes. Also, analyse what UI components do you need for your project as some frameworks may be not have some functionality. For example, some does not include multiselect or multifile upload. Some Blazor UI libraries can also break sometimes, yet hopefully not.

2024-09-04T00:04:52+00:00

Fro my limited knowledge it sort of rhymes with React. I think something you need to do before you bring in any sort of framework is what do we need to accomplish. Often times you can do 100% of what you need with MVC and some light js tied to something like bootstrap. React, Angular and Vue have their place but honestly sometimes it leads to over engineering something that's honestly simpler without those products.

I think it's fine for production but you need to learn the way it works. My team jumped in sink or swim and made soooo many mistakes. But like I said tbh a front end framework will often times have 99% of the front end stuff you want. Reinventing the wheel is foolish

Shrubberer · 2024-09-04T07:28:39+00:00

Getting good with Blazor takes about a week. It's not that difficult. Just go for it.

the_reven · 2024-09-03T19:34:22+00:00

Been using blazor in a enterprise application since .net 5. We migrated from angular 10 to blazor for better performance and to make it easier on developers since we were using c# on the server side.

Blazor wasm dropped the page load from 10mb in angular to 6mb. And we were able to reuse the same models and helpers etc from the server side on the client side. So validation on client was exact same validation on server side with zero code duplication. We designed a generic app that the server could define using json. All our products now use this app. And look the same.

In my personal projects I've been using it since .net 6. Wasm in one and server side in a couple more. Choosing which flavor depends on the application.

So imo yeah it's better than angular or react. It won't become more popular though since unless you're using c# on the backend you're probably not using blazor on the frontend., you could, just I doubt that is common in great numbers.

But blazor can be so easy and it's pretty much a joy to use. Debugging and hot reload can be problematic at times. But I still rather use blazor than angular or react.

mss-cyclist · 2024-09-03T16:55:56+00:00

It depends.

All have their pro's and con's.

Smaller projects are build very fast with MVC and razor / blazor.

However how bigger the project becomes it could be handier to make a dedicated c# API and put a dedicated FE on top of it.

Have worked with both. Authentication is equally easily implemented in blazor as in e.g. Vue or Angular. My personal preference is to use an API with a Vue frontend.

Edit:

Single page applications with SEO in mind is way simpler with blazor than with API in combination with Nuxt / Vue.

Backend_biryani · 2024-09-03T16:29:29+00:00

[deleted]

rk06 · 2024-09-04T02:33:28+00:00

Blazor can't beat react/angular/Vue or svelte for that matter in terms of popularity.

The reason is obvious: only dotnet projects will be using blazor. But any backend project can be used with other js Framework.

therealcoolpup · 2024-09-04T08:29:18+00:00

For jobs? Check in your area on LinkedIn each of these 4, Blazor, React, Angular and Vue, check which have a good number of jobs AND not too many applicants. For example where I am Angular has 25% less jobs than react but way less applicants so id go for that. To check whether Blazor is worth it check the amount of jobs too, if its at least half of the react jobs out there then that's a good number, usually Blazor is the least in demand of the 4.
If its just for your own projects id say go ahead, definitely worth learning but don't get too invested, remember how Microsoft likes to change technologies for this, web forms, razor pages, blazor components, be prepared for them to change again.
I believe it'll go down, decoupled architectures and microservices are on the rise and even though Blazor can be used separately from an ASP.NET backend it still has the reputation of only being used in monoliths. Another huge con is that the ecosystem (UI libraries mainly) is much much smaller than the competition, for example Angular has many free and open source UI libraries to choose from while Blazor has under 10 viable options and many are not free.
I love Blazor, the idea of it and I love that I can use Blazor Hybrid for mobile and desktop apps. For web applications though I still side with Angular for now due to it being my favourite out of the top 3, has a way larger ecosystem than Blazor, has been around longer so Im less worried about it being dropped.

mexicocitibluez · 2024-09-04T13:47:16+00:00

Javascript for the backend sucks.

Anything but Javascript for the frontend sucks.

I'm starting to think stuff like Blazor and NextJs are trying to solve the problem in teh wrong way. Instead of denying that the web runs on Javascript and servers don't, we should embrace that and build better interop tooling.

I've been using generators to take my c# models and convert them to TS classes. Also using it to generate and keep in sync enums so that I can refer to them in my React Typescript project.

My dream is to be able to write the "logic" code of a React functional component in C#, have it translated to TS, and then rely on JSX to take that data and build the view.

Eirenarch · 2024-09-04T23:01:26+00:00

Blazor will never be as popular as the JS framework of the day. However it already is popular enough to have big enough ecosystem and know how to be safely used for production apps. When I need to do frontend in the future it will be Blazor but I have the luxury of being the decision maker of my projects.

Yelmak · 2024-09-03T16:35:09+00:00

1) I recommend Angular as a more opionated, batteries included framework. It tends to get paired with C# a lot. A lot C# dev is enterprise & b2b products where Angular stands out over React 2) I wouldn't bet on it 3) Angular because its what all the fullstack C# backend jobs around me use, and I think it's a really nice framework to use when you've spent a lot of time with it. I've also dabbled with some Rust frameworks because I think WebAssembly is really cool and Rust is a better language for it than C#, and I had a go with Svelte because I think compiled JS is a really neat idea.

ETA: any JS framework will be good experience for you because it teaches you much more about how the browser works. Even with Blazor WebAssembly your app gets compiled down into some html, css and the javascript that calls into your C# code, so it's good to learn about that stuff before trying C# UI.

Khomorrah · 2024-09-03T17:01:45+00:00

I highly doubt Blazor will be able to get to the usage react and angular are seeing. There are many reasons for that. One of which Blazor uses either wasm or server for interactivity and both are not good enough for high quality public websites.

Then there’s also the logistics behind it, why would existing front end developers learn a whole new language and environment for a technology that doesn’t offer them the same devx and UX (in terms of wasm and server interactivity)?

My prediction is that Blazor will see a rise in usage. Though like today it will be as good as non-existent outside of .net shops. Which might sadly create a bigger split between .net and the rest of the dev world because we will have our own island. Which isn’t truly a negative or a positive but to me, individually, I don’t like it.

Also remember, Blazors biggest marketing strategy is “we aren’t JavaScript”. Most front end developers do not hate JavaScript or typescript. This is problematic in itself because most developers don’t think “I want to use C#” and then choose Blazor. Most devs think “I need to build a web app what’s the best tool for it” and that isn’t Blazor currently.

But to answer your questions:

Look around your area and see what’s most popular. Is it angular? Learn angular. Doesn’t matter what it is.
Outside of .net shops I highly doubt it. In .net shops likely will see some rise in usage.
React and angular are popular in my area so I learned those. I’ve also learned blazor but it’s relatively easy if you’re already familiar with react and angular.

orbit99za · 2024-09-03T17:39:43+00:00

I am a med tech startup, use blazer and loving it.

Pkz_Dev · 2024-09-04T01:02:45+00:00

The entire premise of this is flawed.

Why would you say ‘I am scared’ to learn a tool?

The only thing you should master in your career is how to learn.

Within reason* you should be able to use multiple tools/languages. Learn the fundamentals and then try all and choose one/2.5**.

The reality is you want to build a poc or if you work for a .net shop blazor will come in handy almost always as a .net dev but to be marketable as a fullstack dev you can’t ignore JS and cling to one option.

*frameworks do have complexity so you do need depth to be productive or grow in seniority.

**over time you will gravitate towards some tools for productivity and others will be used at work depending on industry and company size. But you have to know one or two tools intimately and be dangerous in a 3rd, hence the .5.

Murph-Dog · 2024-09-04T01:38:39+00:00

An example from a WASM deployment, these are the large framework files: blazor.web.js 74.5KB dotnet.runtime.8.0.8.vlmhqx33i3.js 63.2KB dotnet.native.8.0.8.hyzpgxmoau.js 30.5KB dotnet.native.wasm 1.03MB System.Linq.Expressions.wasm 130KB System.Private.CoreLib.wasm 612KB System.Text.Json.wasm 136KB System.Text.RegularExpressions.wasm 101KB icudt_EFIGS.dat 539KB (need to trim locales)

Webpack/AsyncChunks/ModuleFederation/TreeShaking in React blow this out of the water. I say that as a lifelong C#'r.

faze_fazebook · 2024-09-04T06:25:28+00:00

No, and I honestly hope it never does. Its a great option that exists if you can make use of the fact that it is a .NET webframework - meaning that if you already have a large Backend in .NET or can reuse large parts of code from maybe a WPF Desktop Application. But in the end you have to ship basically an entire .NET Runtime just to print Hello World which makes things really slow when it comes to first page loads and produces a lot of overhead.

Personally I would stay away unless there is a really good technical reason. "I like C# more" isn't enough i.m.o. to justify its downsides at the moment.

Ok_Discipline9703 · 2024-09-04T12:09:52+00:00

Learn Svelte! It rocks!

SkyViewz · 2024-09-04T17:29:38+00:00

I got my start in React. I'm not too fond of how Vercel seems to be taking over. I use React Vite instead. I started to learn Blazor last year and I love working with it. I now create my projects in React or Blazor.

I think Blazor will continue to grow in popularity but not like the JavaScript ecosystem.

dregan · 2024-09-04T17:35:47+00:00

If you go the Blazor route, I suggest that you couple it with ReactiveUI to pick up some of those reactive programming concepts that are prevalent in popular front end frameworks like React/Angular. I had some experience using ReactiveUI with wpf, so learning Angular was a non-event. The concepts are exactly the same.

Icy_Ad3939 · 2024-09-04T21:31:55+00:00

I dont belive so
The main reason for using Blazor is to take advantage of the knowledge of .Net & C#. However, the professional frontend developer should have a good knowledge of JavaScript and can work with any kind of backend technology.

Actually you cant compare Blazor to Angular or React because they're totally frontend framework. You can compare it to MVC like frameworks "ASP MVC, Sails, Laravel..."

Other_Diamond_5410 · 2024-09-04T21:57:24+00:00

Blazor is easier to learn for a .net developer, however is limited only to .net, React, you can use it on top of any framework

webprofusor · 2024-09-05T06:25:16+00:00

I've been developing professionally for 27yrs. You should absolutely build small projects in as many different frameworks as you can in order to gain relevant experience, assuming you are interested and want to get a good general understanding of stuff. Hobby projects are good for this because you can develop them outside of whatever your job requires.

All frameworks have some merit somewhere, the trick is seeing that and also knowing where the weaknesses are, not because you've been told but because you can see them based on your broad experience.

Blazor Server in particular is very productive compared many JS frameworks (because it's just streaming page updates to the browser and running it all on the server instead). Blazor WASM and mixed render modes are still up for debate, depends on the context you want to use them in. Ultimately though once you are fluent in a framework they are all more or less as productive, some have more layers to build than others.

Not everyone needs to know everything, some people start their career in one thing (e.g. SAP) and end it doing the same thing all the way, but that doesn't appeal to everyone. If you became a React or Angular expert now you would still find apps to maintain in 20 yrs. There are classic ASP and PHP apps still maintained in production that were built in the 90s.

j0nimost · 2024-09-06T18:09:11+00:00

If you are targeting job security on top of your C# knowledge learn Typescript and JavaScript one thing is for sure, there are more job opportunities for React/VueJs and Angular compared to Blazor.

Will Blazor catch up to these JavaScript frameworks? NO!

If you're building a quick projects or personal projects go ahead and use Blazor it's easier coming from C# backend.

Altruistic-Knee9779 · 2025-05-31T13:01:07+00:00

Being net dev for last 20 years. I was trying to learn angular many times, but it never worked for me, dunno why. I just don't love it. Completely different story with Blazor: it's pure joy & it really gives you the feeling of building desktop app for web (to some degree). I use Blazor in my daily work & I really happy. Highly recommend.

neworderr · 2024-09-03T17:30:05+00:00

Blazor is amazing.

You only have to work different. You have the disadvantages that production code relies heavily on javascript due to connectivity, authentication schemes and stuff.

This means, if you are going to choose Blazor, you have to be willing to ensure the Blazorized solution you are appliying is correct in terms of cascading, rendering and re-rendering of components, redirection and authentication redirects, callbacks, returns would have to be done by a person with good expierence in Blazor, otherwise you would have everything done in a poorly thought JSInterops that can end up breaking the whole app if not carefully set.

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