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Gatsby

3.3K
2.4K
+ 1
121
Hugo

1.3K
1.2K
+ 1
206
Jekyll

2K
1.4K
+ 1
230

Gatsby vs Hugo vs Jekyll: What are the differences?

Gatsby, Hugo, and Jekyll are popular static site generators that help developers build fast and efficient websites. Let's explore the key differences between Gatsby, Hugo, and Jekyll:

  1. Language and Framework: Gatsby is built on React.js, a popular JavaScript library for building user interfaces, making it an excellent choice for developers familiar with JavaScript and React. Hugo, on the other hand, is written in Go, which offers fast build times and runtime performance. It is a preferred option for developers seeking speed and simplicity. Jekyll is written in Ruby and is well-suited for Ruby developers or those comfortable with Ruby-based tools.

  2. Flexibility and Customization: Gatsby excels in its flexibility and extensibility, offering a vast ecosystem of plugins and themes. Developers can easily integrate data sources and content from various platforms, making it suitable for content-rich websites or web applications. Hugo is known for its impressive speed and minimalistic architecture, making it ideal for building static sites quickly with minimal dependencies. Jekyll, while less performant than Hugo, still provides a range of plugins and themes for customizing sites to fit specific needs.

  3. Performance and Build Times: Hugo stands out for its remarkable speed in generating static sites, making it the fastest among the three. Its build times are often significantly quicker than Gatsby and Jekyll, allowing developers to create and deploy sites with minimal waiting time. Gatsby provides excellent performance, especially when fully optimized, thanks to its usage of React and GraphQL. Jekyll offers decent performance, but larger sites might experience slower build times compared to Hugo and Gatsby.

  4. Learning Curve: Gatsby's React-based architecture means that developers familiar with React can easily adapt to Gatsby's development workflow. However, those new to React might experience a steeper learning curve. Hugo's simplicity and minimalistic approach make it more accessible to developers of all levels, including beginners. Jekyll also has a relatively low learning curve, particularly for developers with prior experience in Ruby.

  5. Community and Ecosystem: Gatsby has a large and active community with extensive documentation, tutorials, and a wide range of plugins and starters. Hugo also has an active community, offering a variety of themes and support forums. Jekyll's community is well-established, given its longevity in the static site generator space, and it boasts a wealth of plugins and templates.

In summary, Gatsby excels in its integration of modern web technologies and content-rich applications, while Hugo's speed and simplicity make it ideal for quick and efficient static site generation. Jekyll offers a reliable and established solution for static site generation, particularly for Ruby developers or those seeking a more straightforward approach.

Decisions about Gatsby, Hugo, and Jekyll
Manuel Feller
Frontend Engineer at BI X · | 4 upvotes · 160.3K views

As a Frontend Developer I wanted something simple to generate static websites with technology I am familiar with. GatsbyJS was in the stack I am familiar with, does not need any other languages / package managers and allows quick content deployment in pure HTML or Markdown (what you prefer for a project). It also does not require you to understand a theming engine if you need a custom design.

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Pros of Gatsby
Pros of Hugo
Pros of Jekyll
  • 28
    Generated websites are super fast
  • 16
    Fast
  • 15
    GraphQL
  • 10
    Progressive Web Apps generation
  • 9
    Easy to connect with lots of CMS via official plugins
  • 9
    Reusable components (React)
  • 7
    Allows to use markdown files as articles
  • 5
    Static-sites
  • 5
    All the benefits of a static website + React+GraphQL
  • 5
    Images
  • 4
    List of starters as base for new project
  • 3
    Easy to connect with Drupal via official plugin
  • 3
    Open source
  • 1
    Gitlab pages integration
  • 1
    Incremental Build
  • 47
    Lightning fast
  • 29
    Single Executable
  • 26
    Easy setup
  • 24
    Great development community
  • 23
    Open source
  • 13
    Write in golang
  • 8
    Not HTML only - JSON, RSS
  • 8
    Hacker mindset
  • 7
    LiveReload built in
  • 4
    Gitlab pages integration
  • 4
    Easy to customize themes
  • 4
    Very fast builds
  • 3
    Well documented
  • 3
    Fast builds
  • 3
    Easy to learn
  • 74
    Github pages integration
  • 54
    Open source
  • 37
    It's slick, customisable and hackerish
  • 24
    Easy to deploy
  • 23
    Straightforward cms for the hacker mindset
  • 7
    Gitlab pages integration
  • 5
    Best for blogging
  • 2
    Low maintenance
  • 2
    Easy to integrate localization
  • 1
    Huge plugins ecosystem
  • 1
    Authoring freedom and simplicity

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Cons of Gatsby
Cons of Hugo
Cons of Jekyll
  • 6
    No ssr
  • 3
    Very slow builds
  • 3
    Documentation isn't complete.
  • 2
    For-profit
  • 2
    Slow builds
  • 2
    Flash of unstyled content issues
  • 1
    Problematic between develop and build commands
  • 1
    Difficult debugging
  • 1
    Too many dependencies
  • 1
    Plugin driven development
  • 1
    Difficult maintenance
  • 4
    No Plugins/Extensions
  • 2
    Template syntax not friendly
  • 1
    Quick builds
  • 4
    Build time increases exponentially as site grows
  • 2
    Lack of developments lately
  • 1
    Og doesn't work with postings dynamically

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What companies use Gatsby?
What companies use Hugo?
What companies use Jekyll?

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What tools integrate with Gatsby?
What tools integrate with Hugo?
What tools integrate with Jekyll?

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What are some alternatives to Gatsby, Hugo, and Jekyll?
Next.js
Next.js is a minimalistic framework for server-rendered React applications.
React
Lots of people use React as the V in MVC. Since React makes no assumptions about the rest of your technology stack, it's easy to try it out on a small feature in an existing project.
Create React App
Create React apps with no build configuration.
WordPress
The core software is built by hundreds of community volunteers, and when you’re ready for more there are thousands of plugins and themes available to transform your site into almost anything you can imagine. Over 60 million people have chosen WordPress to power the place on the web they call “home” — we’d love you to join the family.
VuePress
A minimalistic static site generator with a Vue-powered theming system, and a default theme optimized for writing technical documentation. It was created to support the documentation needs of Vue's own sub projects.
See all alternatives