A Comprehensive Guide On Angular vs React vs Vue :

Which Framework To Choose in 2020?

A few years ago, developers were majorly debating on which framework they 

should be using for their projects : Angular vs React vs Vue. However, over the 

course of 2018 and 2019, there happened to be a growth of interest in a third 

framework known as Vue.js. Going forward into 2020, here we will have a 

detailed discussion on which is perhaps the best solution for you : Angular vs 

React vs Vue. 

If you are a developer who is starting out on a project and is confused as to 

which ​JavaScript framework​ to choose, then this guide should help you make 
a better decision. We would cover various aspects of the three frameworks to 

see how they fit best as per your needs.  

As per the State of JavaScript Survey 2019, React was considered as one of 

the top choices of JavaScript framework and also received an overwhelming 

response from the developers. 

Source: State Of JavaScript 

In the same survey, Vue surprisingly grabbed the second position, leaving 

Angular behind at the third position. 

We know that each and every developer has a different skill level, knowledge, 

unique project requirements, complexities, deadlines, and so on. Thus, if React 

happened to be the top choice of 20,000 developers, it is not mandatory that it 

will fit your project requirements as well.  

So, let’s dive deeper into the trends and compare these top three frameworks 

to make the best choice. We will compare the three JavaScript frameworks 

based on the following criteria: 

● Overview 
● Popularity 
● Performance 
● Learning curve 
● Single-page apps§ 
● Multi-page apps 
● Known Projects 

So, let’s get started… 

● Brief Overview 

Angular:​ Initially released in 2010 by Google developers, this framework’s first 

version was called AngularJS. It is the oldest framework out of the three. 

Based on the AngularJS, the Angular Team from Google released another 

framework in September 2016, known as Angular, but this one was created in 
Typescript. The last released version of Angular is 8, which was introduced in 

November 2019.  

React.js: I​ t was created in 2013 by Facebook developers and quickly won the 

hearts of programmers. It is a component-based UI library for creating user 

interfaces. The current release is 16.x and the announcement of the release of 

17.x is still in waiting. Facebook makes use of React.js a lot in their products 

such as Facebook or Instagram. 

Vue.js8: I​ t is the youngest framework of the three which was released in 

2014. In Spite of this, the framework has a huge popularity, and the 

community of supporters is still growing. The framework was developed by 

Evan You, and is not supported by any big company, rather is sponsored by 

donations. 

● Popularity 

Now, you are aware about the history of the three frameworks. It’s now time to 

check about the popularity of each framework. We are going to look at this 

point from two different prospects, by developer’s interest and by Google 

trends. 

Developer’s interest 
To have a closer look at the popularity of the three frameworks among the 

developers, let’s start from Github statistics. Have a look at the number of 

forks and stars for each framework, and the winners here are VueJS and 

ReactJS. 

Another place where we are going to check the popularity of the three 

frameworks is Google Trends. This will tell us which framework is searched 

the most often in Google Search. 

 
This shows that ReactJS happened to be the most popular framework in 

Google Search during the year, which implies that the popularity of the 

technology is still rising.  

Angular happened to be the second and VueJS the last one, as per the Google 

Search. Although, we must consider the fact that VueJS being the youngest 

framework is doing great. 

● Performance  

Here, we would like to focus more on the technical aspects of the three 

frameworks. Thus, we would have a look at the performance of ReactJS, 

VueJS, and Angular. 

In order to check the loading time and bundle size of the three frameworks, 

three identical and very simple apps were created using Angular, React, and 

VueJS, run them and see the result. One must keep into consideration that the 

apps have been taken as without any additional care about performance. 

Furthermore, one should also remember that Angular comes with everything 

ready for development such as routing, etc. On the other hand, ReactJS and 

VueJS require a bunch of additional libraries.  

Let’s have a look at the bundle sizes: 

From the above table, we can see that ReactJS has the smallest bundle size, 

VueJS has twice that size, while the biggest bundle is from Angular.  

Below, you can have a look at the screens from Chrome DevTools 

performance, and can observe the loading time. Here, the loading time has the 

best result for VueJS, which is about 936ms. React and Angular have similar 

results with about 3300ms.  

Angular – P
​ erformance from Chrome Dev Tools 

React – P
​ erformance from Chrome Dev Tools 
  

Vue – P
​ erformance from Chrome Dev Tools 

● Learning Curve  

As per their background, developers will have varied points of views on which 

framework of the three is the easiest to learn. 

Easiest learning Curve: VueJS 

As per our opinion, VueJS is the most straightforward framework for most 

web developers​ to learn. As it is closest to HTML and JavaScript basics, it will 

feel familiar. Getting started with VueJS is as easy as adding one import to an 

HTML document. As you create more complex apps, VueJS does get more 

complicated. This needs working with .vue files, which needs a more complex 

project setup (although the Vue CLI can make this much simpler) and you will 

have to immerse into more complex patterns.  

Steepest learning curve: Angular 

As Angular uses TypeScript, which is a subset of JavaScript, its learning curve 

happens to be steep. The components, syntax, and modules that you use can 

appear quite different from the JavaScrip syntax that you are used to. Though, 

angular has a lot of robust, built-in features which lead developers into certain 

coding patterns that can prove to be quite helpful in creating applications.   

Medium learning curve: ReactJS 

ReactJS has, what we say, a medium-to-steep learning curve. Though it uses 

an ‘everything is JavaScript’ approach, there are two conditions to ReactJS. 

First is that it works best with ES6 syntax, which can prove to be challenging 

for a beginner developer. The second is the use of JSX, which is a syntax 

hybrid of HTML and JavaScript, and not used for typical JavaScript projects. 
Because JSX looks like HTML, it can be difficult at first, but is still JavaScript, 

leading to some confusion in understanding the code. 

So, the learning curve winner happens to be VueJS. 

● Single-Page Apps (SPAs) 

SPAs are highly reactive, mobile-like web applications having no page 

reloading wait times. The page is based on a single HTML file while 

JavaScript manages everything that the user sees in the browser. When a 

button is pressed or a new window emerges on the page, there’s no request 

made to a server. Rather, the JavaScript is modified and instantly rendered. 

Single-page applications’ popularity is due to the fact that they load so fast. 

So, how do the three frameworks, Angular, VueJS, and ReactJS stack up in 

relation to developing SPAs? Angular was developed by Google explicitly for 

building SPAs. The use of TypeScript and all of the built-in tools and services 

of Angular make SPA development with Angular an amazing experience for a 

developer. Tools such as routing, form validation, and state-management 

solution allow for a fresh and up-to-date development experience. Use of 

VueJS or ReactJS for larger SPAs may bring bigger complexities as compared 

to when using Angular, like the availability of necessary packages for form 

support. 
So, the Single-Page App winner is Angular.    

● Multi-Page Applications (MPA) 

MPA is a typical website like your favorite media site or ecommerce. Each 

time the site wants to send data to a server or to display new data, a request 

is sent to the server, which is exhibited in the browser. 

When ReactJS is used to improve the existing HTML of the page, it works just 

fine for these projects. One can also import ReactJS so as to add robust 

JavaScript-based components to the page. However, for creating ReactJS 

components with JSX, one will still require some type of frontend build 

workflow. Though, in MPAs,VueJS is very straightforward. In order to start 

incorporating its components and features to your page, just import the 

VueJS library and there’s no requirement of special setup. Overall, both 

ReactJS and VueJS work well to add JavaScript functionality to Multi-Page 

applications.  

Here, we can consider VueJS to be a little better as compared to ReactJS as 

there’s no need to use some special syntax (JSX) that needs a build step.  

When creating an MPA, we would not recommend Angular. The all-in-one 

approach of the same to components and its use of TypeScript doesn’t make 

it the right framework here. Importing Angular packages into your HTML 
would prove to be complicated unnecessarily. If you try to compile TypeScript 

within an HTML-driven application such as an MPA, it will impact the 

performance and will also prove to be an annoyance to you as well as your 

development team. Overall, Angular was built to help you create SPAs. 

Though, it might become a more feasible option for MPAs in the future, we 

presently are not there yet.  

So, the Multi-Page Application winner here is a tie between ReactJs and 

VueJS.  

7. Known Projects 

As the last criteria in this list, we would like to mention some well-known 

projects developed using each of the three frameworks, to show you that it is 

possible to develop big things with any of the technology. 

● React.js 

Facebook 

Instagram 
Netflix 

● Angular 

Forbes 

Santander Bank 

BMW Price Calculator 

● Vue.js 

FontAwesome 

9GAG 

Alibaba 

Conclusion: 

In this study, we compared three of the most popular front-end frameworks, 

ReactJs, Angular, and VueJS. 

We started with a brief overview of each framework and later compared the 

popularity of the three. This aspect tells you that if you wish to find a useful 

framework to learn, then the best solution will be ReactJS. When the 
popularity was checked based on the Github statistics and Google Search, 

both VueJS and ReactJs have a strong supporters community.  

When the performance was compared by running three identical apps on each 

of the three frameworks, then ReactJS was found to be having the smallest 

bundle size. However, the loading time was found to be the best in the case of 

the VueJs app. 

Considering all the information you could read in this study, the choice of the 

most suitable framework out of Angular vs ReactJS vs VueJS as per your 

project requirements shall be easier now.  

Hope you find this study useful to find the best framework in 2020 for your 

project. If you have any other query regarding the same, just drop us an email. 

Our team will respond back to you as soon as possible.