Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Highcharts VS Paper.js

Compare Highcharts VS Paper.js and see what are their differences

Note: These products don't have any matching categories. If you think this is a mistake, please edit the details of one of the products and suggest appropriate categories.

Highcharts logo Highcharts

A charting library written in pure JavaScript, offering an easy way of adding interactive charts to your web site or web application

Paper.js logo Paper.js

Open source vector graphics scripting framework that runs on top of the HTML5 Canvas.
  • Highcharts Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-03-16
Not present

Highcharts features and specs

  • Customization
    Highcharts provides extensive options to customize chart appearance and functionality, allowing for a tailored and specific data visualization experience.
  • Cross-Browser Compatibility
    Highcharts ensures compatibility across a wide range of browsers, making charts accessible to users regardless of their browser preferences.
  • Wide Range of Chart Types
    Offers a broad spectrum of chart types, including line, bar, pie, scatter, and more, catering to various data visualization needs.
  • Interactive Features
    Includes numerous interactive features such as tooltips, zooming, and clickable points, enhancing user engagement with the data.
  • Strong Community and Support
    Has an active community and provides extensive documentation, forums, and professional support options to assist users in overcoming challenges.
  • Performance
    Optimized for high performance, allowing for the rendering of large datasets without significant lag or performance issues.
  • Exporting and Sharing
    Built-in options for exporting charts to various formats (PNG, JPEG, PDF, etc.) and sharing them easily.

Possible disadvantages of Highcharts

  • Cost
    Highcharts is not free for commercial use, which may be a drawback for small businesses or individual developers with limited budgets.
  • Steep Learning Curve
    Despite comprehensive documentation, the abundance of features and customization options can result in a steeper learning curve for new users.
  • Dependency on JavaScript
    As a JavaScript library, Highcharts requires a solid understanding of JavaScript, making it less accessible for developers not familiar with the language.
  • Limited Free Support
    While there is a free support forum, professional support options are paid, which can be a limitation for users needing urgent assistance without extra costs.
  • Mobile Responsiveness
    Although Highcharts provides some support for mobile responsiveness, achieving optimal performance and displays on all device types may require additional customization.

Paper.js features and specs

  • Vector Graphics Support
    Paper.js excels in handling vector graphics, making it an excellent choice for creating and manipulating graphics with precision.
  • Scene Graph
    The library uses a scene graph, which facilitates hierarchical organization and management of graphical objects.
  • Rich API
    Paper.js offers a highly intuitive and rich API that simplifies tasks like working with paths, segments, and more.
  • Ease of Use
    With its clear documentation and straightforward syntax, Paper.js is beginner-friendly while remaining powerful for advanced users.
  • Cross-Platform
    Being JavaScript-based, Paper.js works across different platforms and browsers without requiring any additional plugins.
  • Interactive Graphics
    It allows for easy creation of interactive graphics, making it ideal for use in web applications needing dynamic graphic manipulation.
  • Built-In Animation Support
    Paper.js includes built-in support for animations, enabling smooth and complex animations with minimal effort.

Possible disadvantages of Paper.js

  • Performance
    Due to its high-level abstraction and ease of use, Paper.js may not perform as well as lower-level graphics libraries in performance-critical applications.
  • File Size
    Paper.js can be relatively large in terms of file size compared to some lightweight alternatives, which might affect load times.
  • Limited to Canvas
    Paper.js is limited to the HTML5 Canvas element, so it doesn't natively support other rendering contexts like SVG.
  • Animation Flexibility
    While it offers built-in animation support, the flexibility and feature set might not be as extensive as dedicated animation libraries.
  • Learning Curve for Complex Features
    Although it's beginner-friendly for simple tasks, mastering more complex aspects of Paper.js can have a steeper learning curve.
  • Community and Support
    Paper.js might not have as large a community or as extensive support as some other more widely-used JavaScript libraries such as D3.js or Three.js.

Highcharts videos

Angular 2 & HighCharts Quick-Tip: Dynamic Data & Draggable Points (2016)

More videos:

  • Tutorial - How to define the custom colors for Highcharts?
  • Review - Data Visualization HighCharts

Paper.js videos

Revision clouds in AutoCAD using Paper.js

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Highcharts and Paper.js)
Data Dashboard
100 100%
0% 0
Javascript UI Libraries
0 0%
100% 100
Data Visualization
100 100%
0% 0
Flowcharts
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Highcharts and Paper.js

Highcharts Reviews

6 JavaScript Charting Libraries for Powerful Data Visualizations in 2023
However, you might need to pay for additional packages to get exactly what you’re looking for. The Highcharts Core package includes all the essentials (like line, bar, area, and pie charts) but Maps, Gantt, and Stock chart packages are all extra. In terms of cost, this makes Highcharts somewhat less scalable, depending on the budget available for your project.
Source: embeddable.com
15 JavaScript Libraries for Creating Beautiful Charts
Highcharts is another very popular library for building graphs. It comes loaded with many different types of cool animations that are sufficient to attract many eyeballs to your website. Just like other libraries, Highcharts comes with many pre-built graphs like spline, area, areaspline, column, bar, pie, scatter, etc. The charts are responsive and mobile-ready. Besides,...
Best Data Visualization Tools
For companies that want to embed interactive visualizations in their online content, look no further than Datawrapper. Highcharts is another great option for embedding interactive content into your sites, though it’s not as easy for non-specialists as Datawrapper.
Source: neilpatel.com
Top 10 JavaScript Charting Libraries for Every Data Visualization Need
Highcharts is one of the most comprehensive and popular JavaScript charting libraries based on HTML5, rendering in SVG/VML. It is lightweight, supports a wide range of diverse chart types, and ensures high performance.
Source: hackernoon.com
The Best Data Visualization Tools - Top 30 BI Software
Highcharts is a battle-tested SVG-based, multi-platform charting library that has been actively developed since 2009. Its JavaScript API integrates easily, and features robust documentation, advanced responsiveness and industry-leading accessibility support. You can add interactive, mobile-optimized charts to your web and mobile projects. Charts are rendered in SVG and a VML...
Source: improvado.io

Paper.js Reviews

20+ JavaScript libraries to draw your own diagrams (2022 edition)
Paper.js is an open source vector graphics scripting framework that runs on top of the HTML5 Canvas. It offers a clean Scene Graph / Document Object Model and a lot of powerful functionality to create and work with vector graphics and bezier curves, all neatly wrapped up in a well designed, consistent and clean programming interface. It’s based on (and largely compatible)...
8 Best Free and Open-Source Drawing Libraries in JavaScript
The Paper.js library is another free and open-source solution for people who want to draw using JavaScript. The library uses canvas to handle its drawing animations. However, its primary focus is vector-based drawings instead of raster images.

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Paper.js seems to be more popular. It has been mentiond 11 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.

Highcharts mentions (0)

We have not tracked any mentions of Highcharts yet. Tracking of Highcharts recommendations started around Mar 2021.

Paper.js mentions (11)

  • How Framer/Figma is built?
    I started with angular and paper.js: http://paperjs.org/. Source: almost 2 years ago
  • Polygon JS libraries
    In a thread in the Processing forum, Boolean operations in polygons , user ErraticGenerator suggests using g.js or Paper.js. Source: about 2 years ago
  • Looking for a javascript library with good wrapping support
    It is likely that paper.js provides the functionality needed. I will probably investigate it at some point since it appears to be the more popular library Compare paper.js & bezier.js. Source: about 2 years ago
  • Animating an svg
    Just remember you can do some SVG displacement with Paper.JS. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Diagnosing RangeError: Maximum call stack size exceeded in React KeyEscapeUtils
    Our webapp is written with React and Redux using the official react-redux bindings. Another primary library used in this web app is PaperJS. We recently transitioned this to being a Redux app, though it has used React for a while. Source: about 3 years ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Highcharts and Paper.js, you can also consider the following products

D3.js - D3.js is a JavaScript library for manipulating documents based on data. D3 helps you bring data to life using HTML, SVG, and CSS.

p5.js - JS library for creating graphic and interactive experiences

Chart.js - Easy, object oriented client side graphs for designers and developers.

Three.js - A JavaScript 3D library which makes WebGL simpler.

Google Charts - Interactive charts for browsers and mobile devices.

Pixi.js - Fast lightweight 2D library that works across all devices