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Electron

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9.7K
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React Native Desktop

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11
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Electron vs React Native Desktop: What are the differences?

Introduction

Markdown code is a formatting language that converts plain text files into HTML, making it suitable for use on websites. In this task, we will format the provided information about the key differences between Electron and React Native Desktop as Markdown code to be used on a website.

Key Differences between Electron and React Native Desktop

  1. Language and Framework: Electron is built using JavaScript, HTML, and CSS, and uses Chromium to render web applications as desktop applications. React Native Desktop, on the other hand, is an extension of React Native that allows developers to build desktop applications using React components.

  2. Platform Compatibility: Electron is compatible with multiple operating systems, including Windows, macOS, and Linux. It provides a consistent development experience across different platforms. In contrast, React Native Desktop focuses primarily on macOS and Windows and may require additional setup to work on other platforms.

  3. User Interface: Electron allows developers to build desktop applications with a customizable user interface using web technologies. It provides a full-fledged desktop-like experience with access to system-level APIs. React Native Desktop leverages React Native's components and UI elements, providing a consistent experience across different platforms but with a more mobile-centric design.

  4. Performance: Electron applications can be resource-intensive due to the overhead of running a Chromium browser instance for each application. React Native Desktop, by utilizing native components and UI elements, can provide better performance compared to Electron, especially for computationally intensive tasks.

  5. Development Workflow: Electron applications are typically developed using web development tools and libraries, allowing developers to leverage existing web development knowledge. React Native Desktop, being an extension of React Native, allows developers to share code and components between mobile and desktop applications, streamlining the development workflow.

  6. Community and Ecosystem: Electron has a larger community and a well-established ecosystem of plugins, libraries, and tools. It benefits from being widely used for building cross-platform desktop applications. React Native Desktop, being a newer extension, has a smaller community and a more limited ecosystem. However, it can tap into the existing React Native ecosystem, which is already popular in mobile app development.

In summary, Electron and React Native Desktop differ in terms of the language and framework used, platform compatibility, user interface design, performance, development workflow, and community/ecosystem support.

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Pros of Electron
Pros of React Native Desktop
  • 69
    Easy to make rich cross platform desktop applications
  • 53
    Open source
  • 14
    Great looking apps such as Slack and Visual Studio Code
  • 8
    Because it's cross platform
  • 4
    Use Node.js in the Main Process
  • 3
    Pretty awesome
  • 2
    Is native app
  • 2
    Does not include any browser
  • 2
    Memory usage reduced
  • 1
    Quickly convert react.js web app to desktop app
  • 1
    Open source

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Cons of Electron
Cons of React Native Desktop
  • 18
    Uses a lot of memory
  • 8
    User experience never as good as a native app
  • 4
    No proper documentation
  • 4
    Does not native
  • 1
    Each app needs to install a new chromium + nodejs
  • 1
    Wrong reference for dom inspection
  • 0
    Memory usage reduced

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What is Electron?

With Electron, creating a desktop application for your company or idea is easy. Initially developed for GitHub's Atom editor, Electron has since been used to create applications by companies like Microsoft, Facebook, Slack, and Docker. The Electron framework lets you write cross-platform desktop applications using JavaScript, HTML and CSS. It is based on io.js and Chromium and is used in the Atom editor.

What is React Native Desktop?

Build OS X desktop apps using React Native.

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What companies use Electron?
What companies use React Native Desktop?
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    What tools integrate with Electron?
    What tools integrate with React Native Desktop?

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    Blog Posts

    What are some alternatives to Electron and React Native Desktop?
    Photon
    The fastest way to build beautiful Electron apps using simple HTML and CSS. Underneath it all is Electron. Originally built for GitHub's Atom text editor, Electron is the easiest way to build cross-platform desktop applications.
    React Native
    React Native enables you to build world-class application experiences on native platforms using a consistent developer experience based on JavaScript and React. The focus of React Native is on developer efficiency across all the platforms you care about - learn once, write anywhere. Facebook uses React Native in multiple production apps and will continue investing in React Native.
    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.
    JavaFX
    It is a set of graphics and media packages that enables developers to design, create, test, debug, and deploy rich client applications that operate consistently across diverse platforms.
    pygame
    It is a cross-platform set of Python modules designed for writing video games. It includes computer graphics and sound libraries designed to be used with the Python programming language.
    See all alternatives