React & Next.js

Why React and Next.js

React dominates frontend development for good reasons. The component model makes sense. You build small, reusable pieces. You compose them into complex interfaces. The mental model scales from a button to an entire application.

Next.js removes the infrastructure burden. Routing, rendering, optimization, deployment — it handles the plumbing so you focus on your product. The React ecosystem is massive. Need authentication? There’s a battle-tested solution. Need forms? Several options, all solid. Need state management? Pick your philosophy. This maturity means fewer surprises in production.

We chose React and Next.js because they let us ship faster without cutting corners. The TypeScript integration is excellent. The tooling ecosystem is mature. When something breaks at 2 AM, the answer is usually one search away. That reliability matters when your business depends on the software.

What We Build

We’ve built marketing sites that load in under a second. Static generation handles most pages. Dynamic routes pull fresh content for blog posts and case studies. The result: fast initial loads, instant navigation, and happy visitors.

Our dashboard work spans analytics platforms, admin panels, and internal tools. Real-time data updates through WebSocket connections. Complex filtering and sorting happens client-side for instant feedback. Charts render thousands of data points without stuttering.

E-commerce frontends require special care. Product pages need to be fast — every 100ms of delay costs conversions. We use static generation for product catalogs, server-side rendering for personalized recommendations, and client-side updates for cart interactions. Checkout flows get obsessive attention to form validation and error handling.

SaaS applications are our bread and butter. User onboarding flows that guide without annoying. Settings pages with dozens of options that don’t overwhelm. Notification systems that inform without interrupting. We’ve built these patterns enough times to know what works.

Our Experience Level

We’ve been shipping React applications since 2017. That’s not a brag — it’s context. We’ve lived through the hooks migration. We’ve debugged class component lifecycle nightmares. We’ve watched the ecosystem mature from chaos to convention.

Our Next.js experience includes App Router projects and Pages Router codebases. We understand the trade-offs between server components and client components. We know when to reach for server actions and when a simple API route makes more sense.

Patterns we use daily: compound components for flexible APIs, render props when composition needs power, custom hooks for shared logic, context for dependency injection, reducer patterns for complex state. We pick the right tool for each problem rather than forcing every nail with the same hammer.

When to Use React

React fits most web application scenarios. If you need a rich, interactive interface with complex state, React handles it well. If you want access to the largest ecosystem of third-party components, React delivers. If you need to hire developers quickly, React developers are everywhere.

Choose Next.js specifically when you need server-side rendering for SEO or performance. When you want a full-stack framework that handles API routes alongside frontend code. When you value convention over configuration. When you need flexibility in rendering strategies — some pages static, some dynamic, some client-only.

Don’t choose React for simple content sites. Astro or plain HTML will serve you better with less complexity. Don’t choose React if your team has deep Vue or Svelte experience — switching frameworks has real costs. Don’t choose Next.js if you need fine-grained control over every aspect of your build process. The framework makes decisions for you; sometimes those decisions don’t match your constraints.

Common Challenges and How We Solve Them

Hydration mismatches cause cryptic errors. The server renders one thing, the client renders another, React panics. We prevent these by being disciplined about browser-only code. Dynamic imports with ssr: false. Checking typeof window before accessing browser APIs. Consistent date formatting between server and client.

Bundle size creeps up over time. New dependencies, lazy imports that aren’t actually lazy, barrel files that import everything. We audit bundles regularly. We use dynamic imports aggressively. We question every new dependency: is the bundle cost worth the development convenience?

State management complexity grows with your application. We start simple — useState and useReducer handle more than you’d think. We reach for Zustand when we need shared state across component trees. We avoid Redux unless the project specifically requires its patterns.

Performance problems usually stem from unnecessary re-renders. React DevTools Profiler reveals the culprits. Memoization with useMemo and useCallback helps, but we apply it surgically rather than everywhere. The real fix is usually better component structure — moving state closer to where it’s used, splitting large components into smaller pieces.

Testing React applications well requires strategy. We unit test complex hooks and utilities. We integration test critical user flows with Testing Library. We avoid testing implementation details — tests that break every time you refactor are worse than no tests. The goal is confidence that the application works, not 100% coverage.