Next.js 13 is out and Why I can’t keep calm.

It’s here! It’s finally here, just when I thought they’re reaching the pinnacle of innovation and they’re going to be the next Apple by releasing out “performance” improvements, Vercel has proved me wrong. And Boy Oh Boy, did they!

I’ve been a fan of Vercel ever since my developer friend BolG introduced me to Next. At first I was quite skeptical but then I fell in love with the DX after using it.

Before moving on to the core features, I just want to praise the subtle transition animation that Next team has made in it’s logo. Depicting that it’s changed altogether but keeping the fundamentals intact.

  1. Turbopack: Here I was, thinking that Vite.js is THE successor that Webpack deserved, comes Turbopack! Vite by itself felt blazingly fast compared to webpack, but then Turbopack is supposedly 10x faster than that?! I mean WTF?!!!! With this being launched, I’m so damn tempted to get a peek into Tobias Kopper’s brain and want to know what’s his thought process is WRT build tools. Turbopack : Build tools :: Apple Silicon : Chip Industry

  2. Routing system: So…I’m still a bit skeptical on this, as my junior ass dev mind cannot comprehend as to why would we want a separate loading file for each component where we generally have loaders like components common to the entire app. I still need to get my hands on before I can truly comment on the nature of new routing. Other than that, I feel sad for Remix guys, with next having a huge VC support, it’s only going to get more difficult for the Remix folks to stay in the game. No matter what they say, they’re a direct competitor of Next. I have been following Kent C. Dodds since my university time, and the man has all my respect, I just wish they come up with features equally competitive to Next. But, as the wise men say, Competition is always better for the consumers. So cheers!! Devs.

  3. Data Fetching: It didn’t take much long for React to catch the SSR bus by launching React Server Components, and it was nice to see Next adopting React Server Components by default. This would mean majority of your components will be cached, and I think it’s better to do so because only a fraction of the components would need frequent re-rendering. So huge thumbs up 👍🏻 to Next on this Architectural decision.

What I’d want to see “Next”:

I somehow feel Nest.js team could come up with a solution that provides some extra support for Next as a frontend by utilising all new features that they’ve come up with, I don’t know what and how but it just feels like two sons of Javascript have been detached long long ago and someone/something needs to introduce them to each other.

That’s just JS fanboy in me speaking, but all in all I love how the JS ecosystem comes with such exciting features. I still don’t know what kick do these guys get if they offer a 1ms improvement, but from a developers perspective my weekend plans are set!

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