The New React Native Architecture

Theo - t3․gg30 minutes read

The new architecture of React Native, redesigned since 2018 and proven at scale by Meta in 2024, enhances speed, scalability, and the integration of native code, with experimental opt-in starting from version 0.68. Companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and Shopify contribute significantly to its development, aiming to overcome limitations in creating polished experiences, especially for desktop, VR, and console platforms, with a focus on stability and support of existing tools while showcasing future possibilities.

Insights

  • The Facebook team has rebuilt React Native core to improve speed, scalability, and native code integration, with a redesigned architecture showcasing features like server components, streaming, and synchronous layouts.
  • Companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and Shopify play a significant role in React Native's development, while the new architecture, proven at scale by Meta, aims to enhance rendering performance and support features like suspense and transitions, particularly beneficial for desktop, VR, and console platforms.

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Recent questions

  • What enhancements were made to React Native core by the Facebook team?

    The Facebook team rebuilt the React Native core to improve speed, scalability, and the ease of integrating native code.

  • Which companies contribute significantly to React Native's development?

    Companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and Shopify make significant contributions to React Native's development.

  • What are some key concepts included in the term "new architecture" of React Native?

    The term "new architecture" includes concepts like server components, server actions, streaming, and suspense.

  • How does the new architecture of React Native aim to improve user interface experiences?

    The new architecture aims to overcome limitations in creating polished experiences, especially for desktop, VR, and console platforms, by preventing visual jumps and intermediate states during UI updates.

  • Why is enabling the new architecture crucial for React Native features?

    Enabling the new architecture is crucial for features like server components and improved threading models in React Native, enhancing rendering performance and supporting features like suspense, transitions, and automatic batching.

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Summary

00:00

Enhanced React Native Architecture for Improved Performance

  • React Native core has been rebuilt by the Facebook team to enhance speed, scalability, and ease of integrating native code.
  • The new architecture of React Native has been redesigned since 2018, proven at scale by Meta in 2024.
  • The term "new architecture" encompasses various concepts like server components, server actions, streaming, and suspense.
  • React Native team communicates effectively with users, refining information before public release.
  • Experimental opt-in for the new architecture started with React Native 0.68 and has seen continuous improvements.
  • Companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and Shopify contribute significantly to React Native's development.
  • The new architecture aims to overcome limitations in creating polished experiences, especially for desktop, VR, and console platforms.
  • Synchronous layouts in the new architecture prevent visual jumps and intermediate states during UI updates.
  • The use of `useLayoutEffect` in the new architecture synchronously measures and updates layout information, enhancing UI smoothness.
  • Concurrent rendering in the new architecture supports features like suspense, transitions, and automatic batching, improving UI performance and priority updates.

12:19

Enhancing React Native Performance with C++

  • To ensure color consistency across platforms, the chat color transformation code is written in C++.
  • Implementing C++ code into the Android app was challenging but necessary for color matching.
  • React Native now allows calling C++ objects or functions directly, simplifying complex math operations.
  • JSI enables real-time processing of frames in the vision camera library for React Native.
  • Typical frame buffers can reach 10 megabytes per second, translating to significant data sizes.
  • The use of SQLite in the Facebook Messenger app rewrite showcases the power of consistent tools like SQLite.
  • JSI in the new architecture streamlines data serialization between JavaScript and Native memory.
  • The new architecture enhances rendering performance, with a 1500-view component showing slight speed improvements.
  • The new architecture significantly boosts performance on iOS compared to Android due to architectural differences.
  • Enabling the new architecture is crucial for features like server components and improved threading models in React Native.

24:34

"React Native: Future Showcase, Library Maintenance Tips"

  • React Native is not promoting widespread adoption for real production apps, instead focusing on showcasing the future. They advise against using it for such purposes, emphasizing stability and support of existing tools like Pages router. However, for those maintaining a React Native Library, they recommend enabling and verifying use cases, providing instructions and a platform for discussion within the React working group and community. This approach aims to address concerns of library maintainers and facilitate communication on migration to the new architecture, bridging web and mobile development for a seamless user experience.
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