Third coffee in a row…., reading that article about how some consultant is charging $500/hour because he chose Dapper over Entity Framework.

And I’m thinking… am I choosing my frontend frameworks the same dumb way I chose EF Core? Because “everyone uses it”?

This question make me to test this…. Built the same exact dashboard in React, Vue, and Svelte. Not some tutorial project kinda shit… but a real production-like feature.

Let me tell you what I found…

🕸️React vs Vue vs Svelte ?

You already know that last month I built a crypto price tracker for a client. Around 8,247 tokens updating prices. Real-time WebSocket data coming every 2–3 seconds. Filtering by market cap, sorting, search.

It was laggy as hell in React Mann…

Users complained. I blamed it on “too much data” and moved on.

But after few articles, I got curious that what if its not data but its REACT?

So friday night. when I was travelling, I clone the repo three times and built in Vue and Svelte.

🔺 What I Actually Built 🔺

I used the same API. Same logic. Same UI design. Only difference? The framework.

| — Let’s talk about Numbers

Bundle Size (Production Build, Gzipped)

React:   138.6 KB
Vue 3:    87.2 KB  
Svelte:   19.4 KB

I was shocked with Svelte size mann.. it was low as hell.. did check again after 15 minutes.. extracted the zip again and it runs perfectly fine

Svelte’s bundle was 7 times smaller than React. For the exact same feature.

so if anyone living in tier 2 cities then it will load faster and almost by 3 seconds..

| — Time to Interactive (On 3G Network)

React:  3.8 seconds
Vue 3:  2.1 seconds
Svelte: 0.9 seconds

~almost ☝️

Svelte loaded before React even finished parsing the JavaScript file.

Same with the memory usage..

| — After Loading 8,247 Tokens

React:  52.3 MB
Vue 3:  41.7 MB
Svelte: 23.8 MB

This one hit me hard.

| — Real-Time Performance (Updates Coming Every 2–3 Seconds)

Tested on my OnePlus 7T (Snapdragon 660, not some flagship):

React:  Stuttering at 38 FPS, visible lag when scrolling
Vue 3:  Smooth-ish at 54 FPS, occasional frame drops  
Svelte: Buttery smooth 60 FPS, zero lag

Sunday evening while discussing with my fellows on Discord. They are like, “Bro, your React version looks broken.”

That was just React struggling.

— What Actually Happened?

🕸️React — Virtual DOM Problem

function Dashboard({ tokens }) {
  const [filtered, setFiltered] = useState(tokens);
  
  return filtered.map(token => (
    
  ));
}

In this piece it looks simple, But every** WebSocket message **(every 2–3 seconds):

  • React creates 8,247 Virtual DOM nodes
  • Compares them with old Virtual DOM (diffing)
  • Figures out what changed
  • Updates real DOM

That’s happening 20–30 times per minute.

I tried optimizing. Added React.memo() everywhere. Used useMemo() and useCallback() on literally everything. Code splitting with lazy().

Got it from 38 FPS to 47 FPS. Still janky. And my code looked like shit with all those memos.

🕸️Vue


import { ref, computed } from 'vue';

const tokens = ref([]);
const filtered = computed(() => 
  tokens.value.filter(t => t.marketCap > 1000000)
);

Vue 3’s reactivity system only updates components that actually use the changed data, not the entire list like React.

When Bitcoin’s price changes, only Bitcoin’s row re-renders. Not all 8,247 rows.

This is huge. Performance boost was instant. No optimization gymnastics needed.

But Vue still uses Virtual DOM for dynamic content. Still some overhead.

🕸️Svelte


  let tokens = [];
  $: filtered = tokens.filter(t => t.marketCap > 1000000);

{#each filtered as token}
  
{/each}

Svelte doesn’t use a Virtual DOM. It compiles your components to vanilla JavaScript at build time.

There’s no framework running in the browser. No React. No Vue library. Nothing.

When a price updates, Svelte’s compiler generated code that directly updates that specific DOM element. No diffing. No reconciliation.

Just pure JavaScript doing: element.textContent = newPrice;

That’s it.

That’s why it’s 7x smaller and runs at 60 FPS on my mid-range phone.

🔺I am still not saying “No React”

React — When You Need The Ecosystem

  • Large team where hiring React devs is easiest
  • Using React Native and need code sharing
  • Need the massive library ecosystem (Redux, React Query, etc.)
  • Existing codebase where rewrite cost > performance problems

Vue 3

  • New team learning frontend (easiest curve)
  • Need official, cohesive ecosystem (Vue Router, Pinia from core team)
  • Gradual adoption in existing jQuery projects
  • Want good performance without steep learning

Svelte — My New Default (For Serious)

  • Performance matters (real-time apps, dashboards, anything with live data)
  • New projects with no legacy baggage
  • Users on slow networks or budget phones
  • When you actually care about user experience over developer popularity

🕸️Some of the Rules you should make

  • Test on actual user devices — Not your M1 MacBook. Their few bucks Android phones
  • Measure real performance — FPS, memory, bundle size. Not GitHub stars
  • Question defaults — “Everyone uses X” is not a technical reason
  • Users > Developers — Your convenience doesn’t matter if users suffer
  • Show the data — I have screenshots, metrics, proof. Not opinions

Thank you 🖤