React vs Next.js vs TanStack Start: Deciding on the Right Tool
Choosing the right tool for a frontend project is more than just picking something familiar. React, Next.js, and the new TanStack Start framework each solve similar problems in different ways, and understanding their design goals can help you make the best choice for your needs.
React: The Core UI Library
React is the foundational UI library for building interactive interfaces. It doesn’t come with routing, data fetching, or server rendering by default, but it gives you the pure building blocks — components, state, hooks, and rendering. React is flexible, battle-tested, and supported by a massive ecosystem of tools and libraries.
When to use React alone:
- Your app is heavily interactive, and you don’t need server rendering.
- You want total control over your stack and are comfortable choosing your own routing and data libraries.
- You’re building dashboards, internal tools, or SPAs where SEO isn’t a priority.
React is essentially the baseline for everything that follows here.
Next.js: The Production Ready Framework
Next.js is built on top of React and adds routing, server rendering, static site generation, and automatic optimizations. It’s ideal for production applications where performance and SEO matter.
Next.js supports features like SSR, SSG, and incremental static regeneration out of the box, and its App Router makes server components the default. This can simplify building content-rich sites, but it also brings complexity and conventions you have to learn.
Strengths of Next.js:
- Excellent SEO and performance with server rendering
- Built-in file-based routing and tooling that gets you shipping quickly
- Mature ecosystem and widespread adoption
Considerations:
- Automatic caching and server component behavior can feel opaque to debug
- It has heavier defaults and tight integration with the Vercel platform, though it can be deployed elsewhere
Next.js remains the established choice for content sites, e-commerce platforms, and applications where SEO or SSR is critical.
TanStack Start: A New Framework with Strong Dev Ergonomics
TanStack Start is a new full-stack React framework powered by TanStack Router and Vite. It aims to unify modern frontend needs with clearer control and a simpler mental model than larger frameworks, while still offering SSR, streaming, server functions, and deployment flexibility.
TanStack Start takes a different approach than Next.js. It uses traditional client-side React components that are server-rendered by default, giving you SSR benefits with full client-side interactivity. Server Components are planned but not yet supported.
TanStack Start is currently in release candidate and near v1, meaning it’s feature-complete and considered production-ready by many early adopters for real projects, even though it hasn’t reached a stable v1 release yet.
Strengths of TanStack Start:
- Deep TypeScript support and type-safe routing
- SSR and streaming through explicit primitives
- Flexible deployment anywhere JavaScript runs
- Developer experience powered by Vite with fast startup and HMR
Considerations:
- Still newer than Next.js with a smaller ecosystem
- Doesn’t support React Server Components yet, though integration is planned
Many developers report that Start feels closer to the React way of thinking, without as much framework magic, which leads to predictable behavior and easier debugging.
Which One Should You Choose?
React alone is a great core library for flexible UI work and complex SPAs.
Next.js shines when you need SEO, SSR, and a mature framework with established conventions.
TanStack Start is a promising alternative when you want performance, type safety, explicit control, and flexibility without the implicit complexity of larger frameworks.
These tools are not mutually exclusive. For example, you can use TanStack libraries like TanStack Query and Router within Next.js. Understanding the philosophy and current landscape helps you choose with confidence.
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