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Discussion on: Setup a Micro-Frontend architecture in 15min with Vite!

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ozzythegiant profile image
Oziel Perez

This is great for SPAs, but if you guys just want a traditional website with different frameworks for functionality, try Astro instead

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juststevemcd profile image
Steve McDougall

100% recommend Astro over anything else these days. Unless you need something specific from one of the other *kit frameworks

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mairouche profile image
Meidi Airouche Onepoint
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mairouche profile image
Meidi Airouche Onepoint

When choosing between Vite and Astro for microfrontends, it depends on your project’s needs.

Imagine you're building a SaaS dashboard for analytics with microfrontends:

  • Real-time Data Visualization (React): Graphs, charts, and stats that update live via WebSocket or polling.
  • User Management (Vue): Complex CRUD operations with modals, forms, and validation.

Where Astro is Limited:

  • Real-time Interactions: Astro’s static-first model means it struggles with highly dynamic components like live-updating graphs or dashboards that need frequent re-rendering based on API data. You’d have to include several "hydrated islands" (Island Architecture oriented), which increases complexity and runtime costs as Astro initializes these components separately.
  • Complex State Management: Dynamic state handling (e.g., syncing data between user actions and server updates) is cumbersome in Astro because it isn’t built for full-fledged SPAs or highly interactive systems.

Why Vite Excels:

  • Dynamic Features: Vite handles WebSocket-based updates and dynamic rendering seamlessly, with frameworks like React or Vue fully supported out of the box. For example, a live-updating dashboard built with Vite remains performant and developer-friendly.
  • Development Speed: Vite’s Hot Module Replacement (HMR) ensures that developers can see live updates to components like charts or forms without a full reload, even when working across multiple microfrontends.
  • Interoperability: In the SaaS dashboard, you can mix frameworks (React for visualizations, Vue for forms) easily with Vite’s ecosystem and tools like Module Federation to manage independent builds.

Conclusion

Astro is ideal for static pages, but for the dynamic, interactive SaaS dashboard core, Vite’s performance, flexibility, and robust runtime support can make it a better choice.