State Management in React: Lessons Learned After Trying (Almost) Everything
One of the most strategic decisions in any React project is:
“How should I manage the state of this application?”
Over the years, I’ve tested multiple approaches — from local state to external libraries — and here’s a practical breakdown of what actually works (and when):
1. useState / useReducer
- Great for local component logic or isolated features.
- Easy to reason about, minimal setup.
- Doesn’t scale well when many components need to share state.
2. Context API
- Useful for global concerns like theme, language, or auth.
- Can lead to performance issues if values update frequently.
- Best when combined with memoization or smaller context boundaries.
3. Zustand
- Minimal, reactive, and fast.
- Offers selectors and shallow comparison for performance tuning.
- A solid alternative to Redux for mid-sized apps or real-time interactions.
4. Jotai / Recoil / Valtio
- Designed around fine-grained reactivity and atomic state pieces.
- Encourages a different mental model, but offers powerful patterns.
- Best suited for complex UIs with lots of independent state updates.
5. Redux (with Redux Toolkit)
- Still relevant for large-scale enterprise apps.
- Redux Toolkit reduced boilerplate and added first-class support for async flows and immutability.
- Use it when you have complex, interconnected states and need tight control.
Final takeaway:
Choose the simplest tool that solves your current problem clearly and scalably — not the most popular or over-engineered one.
Sometimes the best solution is a hybrid:
-
useReducer+ Context for auth/session flows - Zustand for shared UI state
- Redux for financial dashboards or multi-user workflows
What’s your current go-to for managing state in React?
Have you explored modern tools like Jotai or Zustand?
Let’s share experiences.
Top comments (1)
Love this practical breakdown! Your point about choosing "the simplest tool that solves your current problem" really hits the mark. I've been down the same journey of trying different solutions.
The atomic state approach you mentioned (Jotai/Recoil) has been fascinating to explore. I actually built something in that space - Nucleux - trying to capture that fine-grained reactivity you mentioned while keeping the learning curve minimal. No providers, just atomic updates where only subscribed components re-render.
Your hybrid approach makes total sense too. I've found that different parts of an app often have different state complexity needs. Auth/session with Context + atomic state for UI interactions seems like a sweet spot for many projects.
Curious - have you tried combining any of these tools in a single project? I'm always interested in hearing about real-world hybrid implementations.
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