Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

EJS VS Mustache.js

Compare EJS VS Mustache.js and see what are their differences

EJS logo EJS

An open source JavaScript Template library.

Mustache.js logo Mustache.js

Minimal templating with {{mustaches}} in JavaScript - janl/mustache.js
  • EJS Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-01-11
  • Mustache.js Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-09-22

EJS features and specs

  • Simplicity
    EJS is easy to learn and use, especially for developers who are already familiar with JavaScript. The syntax is straightforward, making it a good choice for quick application development.
  • JavaScript Integration
    Since EJS templates are JavaScript files, you can seamlessly integrate JavaScript code, making it easy to manipulate data and use familiar JavaScript functions.
  • Lightweight
    EJS is a lightweight template engine, which makes it an optimal choice for applications where performance and simplicity are critical.
  • Flexibility
    Allows for the embedding of plain JavaScript within the templates, giving developers the flexibility to add logic directly in their HTML.
  • Partial Templates
    Supports partials, which help to reuse code snippets across different views, promoting DRY (Don't Repeat Yourself) principles.
  • Server-Side Rendering
    Supports server-side rendering, which can improve performance by reducing the amount of client-side processing needed.

Possible disadvantages of EJS

  • Limited Functionality
    Compared to more feature-rich template engines like Handlebars or Pug, EJS offers limited functionalities which might be a drawback for large, complex projects.
  • Debugging
    Debugging EJS templates can sometimes be challenging. Errors within templates can often be vague, making it difficult to trace the root cause.
  • Maintenance
    Embedding a lot of JavaScript within templates can make the code harder to read and maintain, especially as the complexity of the application grows.
  • Performance Overhead
    For very large and complex templates, EJS can introduce a performance overhead compared to more optimized template engines designed for high performance.
  • Community and Support
    While EJS has a reasonable user base, the community and support may not be as extensive as more popular alternatives like React or Vue.js.

Mustache.js features and specs

  • Logic-less Templates
    Mustache.js enforces a logic-less approach to templating, which helps in maintaining separation of concerns by ensuring that templates only concern themselves with presentation and not business logic.
  • Cross-platform Support
    Mustache.js is a JavaScript implementation of the Mustache templating language, which is supported across multiple platforms and languages, making it highly versatile and easy to integrate with various projects.
  • Lightweight
    Mustache.js is a lightweight library with a small footprint, which leads to faster loading times and reduced performance overhead compared to heavier templating engines.
  • Easy to Learn
    The syntax of Mustache is minimalistic and resembles regular HTML, making it easy to learn and adopt, especially for developers familiar with HTML.
  • Prevents Complexity
    By being logic-less, Mustache.js discourages embedding complex logic in templates, which can lead to cleaner and more maintainable codebases.

Possible disadvantages of Mustache.js

  • Limited Logic Handling
    While the logic-less nature of Mustache.js encourages separation of concerns, it can be limiting for developers who need to embed complex logic in their templates, requiring workarounds or supplementary handling in JavaScript.
  • Performance Issues with Large Data
    Mustache.js may encounter performance bottlenecks when rendering large data sets, as the library processes templates and data at runtime.
  • No Built-in Helpers
    Unlike some other templating engines, Mustache.js does not support helpers or custom logic extensions, which can make common tasks cumbersome or require additional code.
  • Lack of Advanced Features
    Mustache.js lacks some advanced features found in other templating engines, such as conditionals and loops within templates, which can limit its functionality for complex applications.
  • Dependency on External Logic
    Because Mustache.js relies heavily on external data processing, it may lead to scattered business logic across the application that might be difficult to manage as the project grows.

EJS videos

Kane Creek - Bestop Trail Review at EJS 2019

More videos:

  • Tutorial - JavaScript Templating Tutorial | Introduction To EJS

Mustache.js videos

Getting started with Mustache.js

More videos:

  • Tutorial - JavaScript and JSON tutorial: JavaScript templating with mustache.js | lynda.com

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to EJS and Mustache.js)
Javascript UI Libraries
67 67%
33% 33
Development
62 62%
38% 38
Front-End Frameworks
100 100%
0% 0
Frontend Development
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, EJS should be more popular than Mustache.js. It has been mentiond 26 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

EJS mentions (26)

  • Next.js vs Express: What to Choose in 2025?
    Express does not provide SEO benefits by default and would require additional configuration with tools like EJS (Embedded JavaScript) or Handlebars for server-side rendering. - Source: dev.to / 2 months ago
  • Chapter 7: HTML part two
    For a more robust approach, we'd probably need to install a templating language of some kind, such as Twig, EJS, Handlebars, Pug or Mustache (this is not a complete list!). Reading the documentation for posthtml-modules, you'll notice it doesn't mention package.json or any of the approaches we've used in this guide. Instead, the examples are in JavaScript and we've advised to add this to our Node application. - Source: dev.to / about 2 months ago
  • Web Components and SSR - 2024 Edition
    Server-side Framework SSR is when you use a framework that runs the HTML templating logic entirely on the server to compose the HTML that will be rendered in the browser. These are frameworks like Ruby on Rails, ASP.Net, PHP, or even Node.js frameworks that use templating languages like Pug or EJS. - Source: dev.to / 6 months ago
  • How to Build an Application With Node.js
    We need a templating engine to render HTML code in the browser using Node.js. We'll use ejs (Embedded JavaScript) for this tutorial but there are others such as Pug (formerly known as Jade) and Express Handlebar, which also render HTML on the server. - Source: dev.to / 9 months ago
  • Getting to the meat and potatoes of serverless recipe parsing with Amazon Bedrock
    The tags is where you put the HTML you want Claude to read. The <%- document %> contained within is an ejs placeholder. More on this shortly. - Source: dev.to / 10 months ago
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Mustache.js mentions (12)

  • Documenting my pin collection with Segment Anything: Part 3
    Mustache.js: This is a templating engine used for rendering templates on the web. In your application, Mustache.js is used to dynamically create HTML forms based on the data received from the server, such as image cutouts and identifiers. - Source: dev.to / 11 months ago
  • NakedJSX - Use JSX without React
    JSX just a templating language in this case, right? No reactivity at all? What's the benefit against using something like https://github.com/janl/mustache.js/ ? Source: almost 2 years ago
  • Im not sure if im asking the right question here, but how do you create separate pages on a website?
    Nonetheless, I made ridiculous simple MRE(minimal reproducible example) for you: Https://codesandbox.io/s/distracted-gauss-gqfiue You might quickly realize the annoyance of html as strings, move to some template then, e.g: https://handlebarsjs.com/guide/ Also this example uses a library for the routing matching. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Managing application cache with react-query, and code generation.
    Mustache.js is a template engine for creating js templates. Cosmiconfig is a tool to make it convenient to work with the configuration. - Source: dev.to / almost 3 years ago
  • After an eternity, java.com has updated its homepage
    For a small page like that, they are using Oracle content management, knockoutjs, RedwoodJs, MarkedJs, MustacheJs, JQuery and Bootstrap. There's like 10+ layers or div, header and nav elements just to display the logo. They can't even properly anchor the footer at the bottom... Source: almost 3 years ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing EJS and Mustache.js, you can also consider the following products

Handlebars - Handlebars is a JavaScript template library that is, more or less, based on ...

Vash - Vash is a template engine that offers a swift flow between code and content using Razor Syntax

Vue.js - Reactive Components for Modern Web Interfaces

FLAVE - Flave was created to bring ASP.

Pugjs - Pugjs is an online platform that manages programming in the best way with powerful tools.

XSLT in-browser implementation - XSLT is a cross-browser API for converting XML data into string or virtual DOM implemented natively with multithreaded streaming processing.