Which one is better Ionic React or React Native : [Latest React Version updates and Features]

Ionic React is the world's most popular framework for building mobile apps with JavaScript. It runs on any platform and is created by Ionic to help develop cross-platform mobile and web applications using the latest features in HTML, CSS and JavaScript.

React Native differs from most current cross-platform application development approaches, such as Cordova or Ionic, in that it actually renders using the native rendering APIs of its host platform. Reviews are typically used to generate existing techniques for creating mobile applications that combine JavaScript, HTML, and CSS. Although this strategy has some benefits, it also has some disadvantages, particularly in terms of performance. Additionally, they frequently lack access to the native UI elements of the host platform.
 

Table of Contents

• What is meant by Ionic React?
• What is meant by React Native?
• Which is better Ionic React or React Native?
• Comparison Between Ionic React vs React Native
• What is React Version 0.69?
• Features of React Version 18
• Overview of upcoming Version 0.70
• What’s New in React Version 0.70?
• Updates of 0.70 
• Improvements in React version 0.70
• Conclusion
   

What do you mean by Ionic React?

Ionic React is an open-source UI and Native API project that includes native functionality for building Progressive Web Apps for iOS, Android, Electron, and other platforms and cross-platform UI components. Ionic React is the authorized React version of the well-known Ionic Framework, which is used by millions of web developers and powers critical apps for organizations like T-Mobile, America's Test Kitchen, Schneider, Medical Answering Service, Yara International, IBM, and others.

Ionic React is a framework for building native mobile apps using Web Components and JavaScript. It enables you to write once and run anywhere: on your desktop browser or in the cloud via a service like Firebase or an Apple iPhone app.
 

What do you mean by React Native?

React Native is an open-source JavaScript framework that allows developers to create apps for several operating systems, including iOS, Android, and the web, all from a single source of code. In 2015, Facebook first made React Native available as an open-source project. It rose to the top of the list of tools used for mobile development in just a few short years. Social Media like Facebook, Skype and Instagram are powered by React Native development and are some of the most popular mobile applications in the world.
 

Ionic React or React Native: Which one is better?

React Native is used to create Javascript applications. With the aid of a mobile Javascript API, which relays necessary data calls and functions to the native platform API, this Javascript code interacts with the platforms (iOS, Android). These two APIs are linked together by a bridge.

React native apps almost operate as if natively developed because of this bridge!

Ionic React is based on Cordova, which relays on a Webview component (UIWebView on iOS and WebView on Android) or a chromeless browser view, in contrast, to React Native, which uses a dynamic runtime approach. The WebKit/Blink HTML layout engine uses the WebView component to render an HTML/CSS user interface.

Javascript-native bridge bridgesnnected by Cordova in the WebView application and Native platform. Using this strategy, the framework can use WebView's camera and other native APIs on the device.
 

Difference Between Ionic React vs React Native

React Native	Ionic React
In Ionic React, React Native has been used to build more than 32K apps.	In React Native, there are 26K apps were created using the Ionic framework.
React Native holds a market share of 4.67%.	Ionic holds a market share of 3.72%.
With a 38% market share, React Native is the second most used cross-platform mobile framework.	With a 16% market share, Ionic is the fourth most well-liked cross-platform mobile framework.
If you look at the top applications, React Native was used in the development of 6.38% of them.	If you look at the top applications, Ionic React contributes only 0.21%

React Version 0.69: The New Version

The first version of React Native to support React 18 is 0.69. Numerous enhancements have been made with React 18, including new hooks as said. New concurrency features like the use of transition and full Suspense support are also included in React 18. React Version 0.69 by default has React 18 enabled. However, you will only be able to use the features that don't use concurrent rendering and concurrent features if you haven't migrated to the new architecture. Concurrent rendering has been a design goal for the New Architecture, but we are unable to add that support for the Old Architecture A compatible version of Hermes will be shipped along with React Version 0.69. Making this adjustment will greatly increase the stability of using Hermes in React Native.

These React Versions will take care of using the correct version of Hermes, but to make sure the integration functions as intended, make sure to follow the instructions in the upgrade helper. You can use these instructions to enable Hermes if you haven't already. While we will continue to support other JavaScript engines, we strongly advise everyone to switch to Hermes for the best performance and to ensure that we can provide you with better support.
 

Features of React Version 18

There are three features of React Version 18:
 

• Automatic  Batching
• Transitions
• Suspense on the server
   

Automatic Batching

State updates invoked from any location will now always be batched by React version 18. This will batch state updates, including timeouts, intervals, timeouts, native event handlers, and asynchronous operations.

To comprehend how automatic batching functions, let's take a look at a basic React application. Let's start by installing the most recent beta of React Version 18 (npm install react@beta react-dom@beta) and creating a new React project. The index.js file must then be updated to use the createRoot() API in order to enable Automatic Batching for all React 18 features. Let's now add three event listeners to the App.js file, one of which contains state updates that are called using:

• Event Handlers.
• Timeouts.
• Asynchronous Operations.
   

Transitions

To distinguish between urgent and non-urgent updates, React introduces a brand-new idea called Transition. It helps developers give updates that they anticipate users interacting with more frequently a higher priority. Direct interactions like pressing, clicking, and typing are displayed in urgent updates. updates that change the user interface's view transition from one to the next. Urgent updates involving actual objects necessitate a speedy response in order to match the user's experience and intuition. They get confused if there is a slight delay when pressing a button because they anticipate an immediate response. Users are more patient with transition updates because they are aware that their actions, like switching between pages, might not immediately produce an effect on the screen. For instance, even though the contents of a drop-down menu may load with a slight delay, it is understandable that a user would want the drop-down menu to appear instantly when they click on it. Users will be understanding of updates, particularly if you classify the data using new attributes. In order to provide the best user experience, single-user input should result in both an urgent and non-urgent update. In React 18, developers can tell React which updates are urgent and which aren't by using the start transition API within an input event.

 

Suspense on the Server

Suspense on the server now has support in React 18. With the aid of suspense, you can tell React to delay loading a slow component by enclosing it within the Suspense component. Additionally, you can use this to define a loading state that will be displayed while it loads. One sluggish component no longer has to cause your entire app to render slowly in React 18. Suspense allows you to instruct React to send HTML for other components, such as a loading spinner, before sending HTML for the placeholder. The server renderer will then insert its HTML into the same stream once the slow component is prepared and has fetched its data.
 

React Version 0.70: Overview

React Version 0.70, the most recent version, includes a number of enhancements and continues to roll out the new React Native architecture. Although it has long been available, it was initially an add-on that required installation and configuration separately when creating a React Native app. Beginning with React version 0.69, Hermes was bundled with React Native beginning with React version 0.69, making it simpler to enable and use while also making it easier to stay in sync with the rest of the framework. Hermes became the default JavaScript engine in the most recent release, React Version 0.70, so no additional installation or configuration is required.
 

What’s New in React Version 0.70?

React Version 0.70 has just been released, and we couldn't be more pleased. This React version includes a number of upgrades, including updated New Architecture documentation, a new, unified configuration for Codegen, Hermes as the default engine, and full CMake support for Android builds. The New Architecture experience is the focus of some of the release's more significant changes. However, there have also been some other significant changes, such as:

• Set mac catalyst enabled to true in the Podfile to activate the Catalyst fix (see upgrade-helper diff for details).
• React JSX Transform is now supported with Metro version 0.72.0: reactjs.org/blog/2020/09/22/introducing-the-new-jsx-transform.html.
• Removing react native tips JNI, which saves about 220 KBs from each Android APK build because it is created from the same sources as react native JNI. 
   

Updates of version 0.70

Additionally, we updated a few of our dependencies:

• Upgrade RN CLI to react version 9.0.0
• Upgrade the Android Gradle Plugin to 7.2.1
• Upgrade Gradle to 7.5.1
• Raising RCT-Folly to July 22, 2021.
• Increase Metro to 0.72
• Achieve SoLoader 0.10.4
   

Improvements in React Version 0.70

A number of enhancements that enhance the React Native build and development process are also included in react version 0.70, especially when working with the new architecture.
 

Auto-linking for New Architecture libraries on Android

An essential step in the React Native development process is auto-linking. It enables us to use a package manager like yarn or npm to integrate native code into projects via JavaScript modules. New architecture libraries required manual linking on Android prior to this release, but as of 0.70, both iOS and Android fully support auto-linking.

 

Android Builds for Full CMake Support

Instead of relying on the less popular NDK build system, the new release enables full CMake support for Android builds. Better support, smaller configuration files that are simpler to maintain and upgrade, and integration with a more developed CMake ecosystem are all benefits of this.
 

New Configuration for Codegen

The majority of library developers creating bindings between JavaScript and native code will be interested in this change. React Native uses Codegen to automatically create native code bindings from JavaScript specifications. Codegen needed different configurations for iOS and Android prior to the current release, but as of 0.70, the configurations have been unified, making the process of integrating with native code easier.
 

Conclusion

Both Ionic React and React Native are excellent options for creating mobile applications. React Native might be a better fit for teams that are only targeting iOS and Android, have more experienced JavaScript developers or traditional native developers, and have access to a repository of native controls. This explains why consumer app startups with a background in native app development favour React Native. Ionic React will probably be a better fit for teams that have traditional web development expertise and libraries and want to target mobile and web (as a Progressive Web App). This explains why Ionic has been effective with startups and business teams that have a stronger background in web development.