Angular vs. React — Which One Should You Use for Front-End Development?

Angular and React are two excellent frontend frameworks that could bring a lot of value to your tech stack. But which one is better?  

Both Angular and React have a lot to offer, but they also have some differences. Angular is a JavaScript framework that was originally built by Google in 2009 and is one of the oldest front-end frameworks available today. React, on the other hand, is a library created by Facebook back in 2013 and has since become one of the most popular libraries used today.

But what exactly are these differences? And which one should you choose based on your needs, both current and expected? 

In this article, we’ll compare these two popular options to help you decide which one would be best for your project. Let’s get started learning more about Angular vs. React to decide which one will better serve you and your business!

Are Angular and React the same?

If you’re wondering whether Angular and React are the same, the short answer is still no. Angular is a full-fledged, opinionated framework built with TypeScript, offering everything developers need out of the box: routing, forms, dependency injection, and testing utilities. React, on the other hand, started as a lightweight JavaScript library for building user interfaces.

However, the landscape has changed. While React is technically still a library, in practice it has grown into much more. Thanks to the rise of frameworks like Next.js and Remix, as well as a rich ecosystem of tools for routing, state management, and server-side rendering (SSR), React now functions as a de facto framework in most real-world projects. For that reason, we’ll be referring to both Angular and React as “frameworks” throughout this article.

In practice, teams tend to choose one over the other depending on the project’s nature. Angular is often used for complex, enterprise-grade applications such as large-scale single-page apps (SPAs) or progressive web apps (PWAs), where stability, built-in tooling, and long-term maintainability are critical. React, on the other hand, dominates in projects where flexibility, high interactivity, and fast development cycles matter most — from startup MVPs to global products like Instagram and Facebook.

When it comes to learning, React still has a gentler learning curve, since developers can start small and add complexity as needed. Angular remains more challenging to learn because it’s a comprehensive framework with many built-in concepts, but once mastered, it provides structure and consistency that many enterprises value.

To better understand their strengths, let’s take a closer look at what React and Angular provide today.

What is React?

React (or React.js/ReactJS) is a Facebook-developed frontend JavaScript library for building user interfaces. To describe the UI state, React employs a declarative style of programming. With a declarative approach, the developer focuses on defining what the intended result is (eg. “a modal window should appear to prompt user action”) rather than providing explicit instructions on how this is going to happen. This makes it easier to determine how the application will look and function for users and to figure out how users would actually interact with the app.

React is also utilized to create both web applications and native-rendered apps, as well as mobile applications. React comes with two features that have been well-received by the community of JavaScript developers: virtual DOM and JSX. You may also include reusable library code (which saves time and reduces the risk of coding mistakes) in your project. 

Component-based and declarative features make it simple for developers to create interactive and advanced UIs. React’s “learn once, write anywhere” principle enables fast development for all platforms.

Read also: 5 Reasons to Use React for Web Development

What is Angular?

Angular is a TypeScript-based development platform. It’s a free and open-sourced web application framework designed by the Angular Team at Google, as well as by a community of individuals and businesses. 

In 2009, Google began developing it to support website creation. It’s also one of the most highly regarded JavaScript platforms, as it aims to make front-end development much simpler and accessible. Not only that, Angular uses a component-based framework for building web applications that are scalable. 

It has a variety of well-integrated libraries and features, such as client-server communication, routing, and more. It provides a collection of developer tools to help you create and scale apps from small single-developer projects to large enterprise solutions. 

Now that you have a better understanding of each of these popular frontend frameworks, let’s take a look at the…

Differences between React and Angular

In order to understand whether Angular vs. React is best for your front-end development, you will first need to understand the differences between the two. 

Data binding — how does it differ in both technologies?

React: A one-way binding method is used. It indicates that the Ul elements can’t be modified unless the corresponding model state is updated.

Angular: A two-way binding method is used. It allows you to guarantee that the model state changes whenever any change is made.

The best option for data-binding: Angular. This is due to the automatic changes that are possible in this framework, which will save your team the time and effort otherwise spent on manual model state updates.

Scalability of React and Angular 

React: React has evolved far beyond being just a lightweight UI library. Thanks to the maturity of its ecosystem — particularly frameworks like Next.js and Remix, along with modern state management libraries such as Redux Toolkit, Recoil, or Zustand — React applications can now scale to enterprise-level complexity. Companies like Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram still rely on React, and it powers countless large-scale products worldwide.

Angular: Angular continues to provide a full set of tools out of the box, including routing, dependency injection, forms, and testing utilities. This makes it a natural choice for enterprise-scale projects, where consistency, maintainability, and built-in best practices are critical. Angular also benefits from the introduction of the Signals API, which improves reactivity and scalability in complex applications.

The best option for scalability: Both frameworks now scale exceptionally well. Angular enforces a clear structure and comes with everything built-in, which enterprises appreciate. React offers flexibility and modularity, allowing teams to pick the tools that best fit their project. The decision depends more on your team’s preferences: *choose Angular for strict architecture and consistency, React for flexibility and ecosystem-driven growth.

Dependency injection

React: React does not support dependency injection completely. For all the components, React maintains a global state.

Angular: Dependency injection is wired into Angular framework that enhances modularity and allows services & data sharing between the components.

The best option for dependency injection: Angular fully supports dependency injections, whereas React doesn’t. With Angular, your developers will avoid the time and effort needed to handle dependencies manually. If this is a requirement for you, then Angular would be best.

Read also: Building an app prototype

Testing of the application

Both Angular and React offer mature testing ecosystems today.

Angular ships with built-in testing tools (Jasmine, Karma), while React has standardized around Jest, React Testing Library, and Cypress.

In practice, React’s testing setup is no longer more complex — both technologies provide reliable, well-documented solutions for unit, integration, and end-to-end testing.

Document Object Model (DOM)

Every time a web browser updates anything in your app, the Document Object Model (DOM) is involved — it’s the data structure behind all elements on the screen. Since DOM updates can be expensive, modern frameworks optimize how they handle changes.

React: Uses the Virtual DOM, which creates a lightweight copy of the real DOM. When something changes, React compares the new virtual tree with the previous one and only updates the parts of the actual DOM that differ. This makes it efficient for apps with frequent, small UI updates.

Angular: Uses the Incremental DOM and, since Angular 16, the Signals API to make reactivity more predictable and performant. Instead of rebuilding the whole structure, Angular updates elements in place and leverages Signals to track and optimize state changes at a granular level.

The best option regarding DOM: It’s no longer just a matter of preference. React’s Virtual DOM is ideal for highly interactive UIs that update often, while Angular’s Incremental DOM + Signals provide a structured and scalable way to handle complex state across large applications.

Performance

React traditionally delivered faster performance thanks to its Virtual DOM and unidirectional data flow, which made it especially efficient for highly dynamic interfaces.

Angular, however, has significantly improved over the last few years. Since Angular 16, the introduction of the Signals API and optimized change detection mechanisms have boosted performance in complex applications. Combined with Ahead-of-Time (AOT) compilation, Angular can now handle large-scale apps with efficiency comparable to React.

The option with the fastest performance: Today, both frameworks perform exceptionally well, but in different contexts. React excels in dynamic, frequently updated UIs, while *Angular’s architecture and reactivity model give it an edge in large enterprise-grade projects where stability and scalability matter most.

Angular vs. React — popularity

According to recent developer surveys (Stack Overflow 2024, GitHub stars, and job market data), React is still the most widely used front-end framework, powering applications from startups to enterprises. Angular remains strong, especially in large-scale enterprise projects, but has dropped to 6th–7th place in popularity rankings.

On GitHub, React has over 230,000 stars, while Angular counts around 96,000–98,000. In the job market, React clearly dominates: surveys show React appears in over 50,000 active job postings, compared to around 23,000 for Angular — roughly a 2:1 ratio.

In short: React is the top choice for most developers thanks to its flexibility, ecosystem, and huge community support. Angular remains relevant, especially in enterprise-grade projects that require strict architecture and out-of-the-box tooling.

Learning difficulty

React: If you want to code by yourself or just understand what your developers are doing, it is worth noting that React’s learning curve is a lot less steep than that of Angular. This is because all the components’ code is in the same file.

Angular: Since so much of Angular’s framework is comprehensive, it doesn’t need much integration with other software to run optimally. It has many concepts and syntax, making it actually harder to learn.

The best option for ease of learning: React. There are a lot fewer concepts and syntax with React, and with all the code accessible in one file, it is an easier framework to learn.

As can be seen above:

• Angular is best for data binding, language, component architecture, scalability, dependency injection, and testing. 
• React, on the other hand, is the most popular, has faster performance, and is the easiest to learn. 
• With regard to performance, it is all relative. While React offers faster performance, Angular provides a more comprehensive framework. So this will depend on your needs for the front-end framework.

Now comes the important questions to ask yourself:

Should I use Angular or React? How to decide?

When deciding whether to use Angular or React, it’s often difficult to make the right call. It’s easier when you know which framework works best, as it should be custom-tailored to your specific requirements.

Here is a brief rundown on how to decide whether to use Angular or React:

• TypeScript used in Angular is a statically typed programming language that you can use to detect potential errors during the compile process, rather than a dynamically typed one that uses runtime (JavaScript).
• Because TypeScript allows you to write explicit types in your code, it is attractive to developers who come from statically typed languages to use Angular.
• Angular‘s two-way data binding, in contrast to React’s one-way data binding, ensures that data is always up to date at all levels.
• The learning curve for React is simpler, so the transition period is much shorter.
• React is less opinionated: it doesn’t enforce a specific app architecture and code organization, which leaves more freedom to structure your codebase in a custom way.

In a nutshell, React excels in the case of shorter, simpler tasks, while Angular shines when it comes to longer, more complicated endeavors.

So, now’s the time to decide.

React or Angular — which one is better in 2022?

If you’re creating an enterprise-grade application that must include sophisticated functionalities like progressive, single-page, and native web apps, then Angular is a better choice than React. React, on the other hand, specializes in UI components and may be used in any type of app, which includes single-page applications.

The way that pages are rendered is different for both technologies. Angular employs a real DOM implementation, but it adds a unique mechanism of change detection combined with zones to make web applications more responsive. React uses a virtual DOM approach, which makes data refreshing faster in web apps. 

Both frameworks have their own set of strengths for creating high-performing web applications. Although React may be a better choice when you’re just starting off with your app and don’t need to add many new features, Angular may be a better option if you plan to build up the app, add new features, and scale it as the business grows.

Finally, React is a simple solution for getting the job done since it has nothing to do with arranging HTML. Rather, it uses the simplest methods to reuse UI components. While Angular is capable of handling several distinct tasks on its own without depending on any additional assistance, it may appear difficult at first.

React vs. Angular — summary

So, have you got your answer to the question of “React vs. Angular which is better”? Let’s recap quickly.

Angular works best for larger projects, while React is great for small projects. In terms of syntax, Angular has an edge with its HTML-like templates, while React’s JavaScript code is more concise. Finally, React is better for creating reusable components, while Angular is great for creating reusable modules.

In a nutshell, if you’re working on an enterprise application with up to 100 pages that will be used by millions of people, then Angular development services can be the best fit for this type of project. Similarly, if you need to build scalable apps that work across different devices and will be used by thousands of people, then React development services are your best bet.

Both are popular front-end development tools that allow developers to build interactive and engaging websites. They both have strengths and weaknesses in certain areas of functionality, so it’s not a simple decision!