About React
React is a JavaScript library for building user interfaces on the web and in native apps. It is developed by Meta and a large open source community.
What it does
React lets you break a screen into small pieces called components. Each component is a JavaScript function that describes what should appear for the data it receives. When that data changes, React updates the screen to match, so you describe the result rather than each step of the update.
Key features
- Reusable function components
- Markup written inside JavaScript with JSX
- Conditions, lists and event handling in plain code
- State that updates the screen when it changes
Who it's for
Front-end developers who build interactive websites, web apps or dashboards. It also suits teams that want to share components across several projects, and developers who want one way of thinking about both web and native interfaces.
Pricing and good to know
React is free and open source under the MIT license. It is a library for the view layer, so most projects add a router, a build tool or a full framework to handle navigation, bundling and server rendering.
Highlights
- Build screens from reusable function components
- Write markup alongside JavaScript logic with JSX
- Update the screen when component data changes
- Combine components written by different teams
- Handle user input and keep state in components
