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Surprisingly, the TypeScript CLI is the second most popular build tool after Webpack, at 79% usage. The usage was up from 62% in the 2020 survey, so the usage is proliferating. The TypeScript CLI is the main way to compile TypeScript projects. However, projects like esbuild and SWCD offer TypeScript compilation, and TypeScript cannot do much beyond compiling TypeScript.
Fastify is unique in that it is not designed to be used with a front-end framework. Instead, it is more like Express, just significantly faster. According to Fastify's own benchmarks, Fastify is more than 3x faster than Express. Fastify also offers built-in support for JSON parsing and JSON Schema. Fastify's performance has given it 11% usage and 60% interest, which is not bad for a new Express alternative.
Webpack is the most used bundler/build tool (no surprises here). That is because Webpack was created when the alternatives were much worse, and it has been able to retain its dominant position. However, it is now being challenging by alternatives like Vite, so its future domination is uncertain.
Vue is a newer alternative to React that has grown over the past few years. It now has a 51% usage rate and seems like it could surpass React in the future. Vue has the advantage of a different template syntax and is faster, both in loading speed and runtime performance.
Vitest is a mostly Jest compatible testing framework that uses Vite under the hood. Using Vite makes Vitest significantly faster than Jest and makes it possible to use only one build pipeline for testing and building if you use Vite already. Vitetest has been well received, with satisfaction at 94% and interest at 82%. In fact, the most modern testing pipeline you could use is probably Testing Library running on Vitest.
Vite is a bundler that has quickly grown to 30% usage and is used by frameworks like SvelteKit and Astro, despite only becoming public in the past two years. Vite also has the highest satisfaction rating, at 98%. Most people attribute Vite's popularity to its massive speed improvements due to ESM and easy configuration. Vite's growth is also bolstered by the fact that was created by the team behind Vue and is used in modern Vue frameworks like Vitepress.
esbuild and SWC are both JavaScript build tools that are significantly faster than previous tools due to the choice to use languages like Go and Rust, as well as better multithreaded design. They replace tools like Babel and Terser and can be tens of times faster. That speed has brought large amounts of interest (81% for esbuild and 75% for SWC) and satisfaction (96% and 94% for esbuild and SWC, respectively). SWC is especially notable, as Next.js recently adopted it, so it has a bright future ahead.
Svelte and Solid lead the front-end frameworks in satisfaction, both with 90%. Svelte has been around for a few years and offers a concise template syntax and a compiler that compiles to native JavaScript. Developers use Svelte for its performance and the power of the templating language, which offers things like two-way binding and the ability to update the DOM by reassigning a variable with data rather than having to use something like setState(). Svelte has already gained some usage, with a 20% usage rate.
React has been the most popular front-end framework in the State of JS for 5 years and continues this tradition this year. React has a usage rate of 80%, significantly higher than the next most popular framework, Angular (at 54%). React is popular because it is relatively stable and established and has a lower learning curve than something like Angular. For more information on why Facebook created React and its current state, take a look at State of the Web: React. However, newer frameworks have some advantages over React, which this article covers later.
Nowadays, many backend frameworks use front-end frameworks. For example, take the second most popular backend framework, Next.js. Next.js is built for React. In fact, about half of the frameworks in State of JS integrate with various front-end frameworks like React, Vue, and Svelte. This trend is quickly growing as people look for alternatives to running a Single Page App (SPA) due to SPA's SEO and performance.
Once again, we see Svelte. However, this time it is for Svelte's official framework, SvelteKit. SvelteKit offers built-in server-side rendering and static generation for Svelte websites, as well as other helpful features for Svelte developers. SvelteKit is like Next.js, but it is the official Svelte backend framework, and it is for Svelte, not React. Because Svelte has such high satisfaction and SvelteKit works very well with Svelte, SvelteKit has a satisfaction rate of 96%, which is the highest satisfaction out of all the backend frameworks.
Jest, an easy-to-use testing library from Facebook, is the most popular JavaScript testing library. It has a usage rate of 73%, which is significantly higher than the next most popular's, Mocha (50%). Jest's popularity is due to its ease of use and speed.
Express is a basic Node.js backend framework that provides routing and middleware. That simplicity has made it the most used backend framework by a large margin, with 80% usage, compared to 45% for the next highest, Next.js. Express also tops awareness and does moderately well in interest at 59%. Additionally, Express is growing, so it does not seem like it will soon lose its throne.
esbuild and SWC are both JavaScript build tools that are significantly faster than previous tools due to the choice to use languages like Go and Rust, as well as better multithreaded design. They replace tools like Babel and Terser and can be tens of times faster. That speed has brought large amounts of interest (81% for esbuild and 75% for SWC) and satisfaction (96% and 94% for esbuild and SWC, respectively). SWC is especially notable, as Next.js recently adopted it, so it has a bright future ahead.
Astro is probably the most innovative of the bunch. Not only does it offer partial hydration on the component level using the "Islands" architecture, it also supports multiple different client-side frameworks. You can even use multiple at the same time. For example, you could code most of your site in Svelte but then use React for one component and avoid hydrating the components that are not needed to be interactive, even if other components on the page need to be interactive. These features brought Astro 3% usage and 66% interest, despite Astro being published partway through 2021.