Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

React-Static VS GatsbyJS

Compare React-Static VS GatsbyJS and see what are their differences

React-Static logo React-Static

A progressive static-site framework for React!

GatsbyJS logo GatsbyJS

Blazing-fast static site generator for React
  • React-Static Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-09-30
  • GatsbyJS Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-09-12

React-Static features and specs

  • Performance
    React-Static pre-renders pages and serves static files, leading to increased performance and faster load times compared to client-side rendering frameworks.
  • SEO Benefits
    By generating static pages, React-Static allows better indexing by search engines, making it more SEO-friendly than traditional single-page applications.
  • Developer Experience
    It offers a familiar React-based development experience and streamlined setup process, making it easier for developers already familiar with React.
  • Data Fetching
    React-Static supports various data fetching methods, allowing developers flexibility in pulling data from APIs or local files during build time.
  • Extensibility
    Its plugin architecture enables developers to extend functionalities, such as adding plugins for data fetching, routing, or SEO enhancements.

Possible disadvantages of React-Static

  • Build Time
    For larger sites with many pages, build times can increase significantly, which may be a drawback compared to server-side rendered solutions.
  • Dynamic Content
    Handling frequently updating or highly dynamic content can be challenging, as React-Static is optimized for static content.
  • Community and Support
    Compared to more popular alternatives like Next.js, React-Static has a smaller community, which might mean fewer third-party resources and less frequent updates.
  • Learning Curve
    For developers new to static site generation or React, understanding the nuances of React-Static and its build routines might require additional learning.
  • Limited Use Cases
    It is primarily beneficial for static sites, which means it might not be suitable for projects requiring extensive client-side interactivity or real-time features.

GatsbyJS features and specs

  • Performance
    GatsbyJS pre-builds your site into static files for fast load times and instantaneous page loads thanks to features like code splitting, PRPL pattern, and Asset Optimization.
  • SEO-Friendly
    GatsbyJS generates static HTML, which helps search engines to index your site more effectively. Additionally, you have fine-grained control over metadata and other SEO optimizations.
  • Rich Plugin Ecosystem
    GatsbyJS boasts an extensive plugin ecosystem that covers a wide array of functionalities such as sourcing data from CMSs, adding analytics, integrating with various APIs, and much more.
  • Strong Community Support
    Gatsby has a robust and active community that provides ample documentation, tutorials, and support to help you get started and troubleshoot issues.
  • Secure and Scalable
    Since Gatsby sites are static, they are inherently more secure against traditional web-based vulnerabilities and can be scaled easily by deploying to a CDN.

Possible disadvantages of GatsbyJS

  • Build Time
    For larger sites, build times can become noticeably long as Gatsby rebuilds the entire site. This can be a bottleneck for frequent updates.
  • Less Suitable for Dynamic Content
    Since Gatsby generates static pages, it's less suited for applications that require real-time data updates or dynamic content unless they are integrated with client-side JS or third-party services.
  • Initial Setup Complexity
    Getting started with Gatsby can be complex for beginners unfamiliar with React and GraphQL, as it requires knowledge of these technologies.
  • GraphQL Learning Curve
    A significant part of customizing and extending Gatsby sites involves GraphQL queries, which can be a barrier for developers who are not yet familiar with GraphQL.
  • Plugin Quality Variability
    While Gatsby has a rich plugin ecosystem, the quality and maintenance of plugins can vary, requiring developers to vet the plugins they choose to integrate into their projects.

React-Static videos

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GatsbyJS videos

The Great Gatsby - Movie Review by Chris Stuckmann

More videos:

  • Review - The Great Gatsby movie review
  • Review - The Ultimate Gatsby Moving Rubber Review!

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to React-Static and GatsbyJS)
Developer Tools
29 29%
71% 71
CMS
10 10%
90% 90
Blogging
0 0%
100% 100
Open Source
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare React-Static and GatsbyJS

React-Static Reviews

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GatsbyJS Reviews

Top JavaScript Frameworks in 2025
Gatsby JS is a free, open-source, React-based framework that is used to create static websites. It has a great ecosystem of plugins that serve various needs like sourcing data from CMSs, integrating tools, managing images using lazy loading, and more.
Source: solguruz.com
Top 10 Next.js Alternatives You Can Try
Gatsby allows you to add plugins with versatile functions and customization to increase your efficiency when developing websites. Here, you can use multiple styling approaches like Sass and CSS-in-JS library solutions to build web pages more smoothly. Moreover, using Gatsby as an alternative to Next.Js provides you with a complete learning guide to enhance your developing...
20 Next.js Alternatives Worth Considering
A React-based maestro, Gatsby transforms the way sites come to life by hooking into a rich set of data sources. Picture this: a web that’s blazing fast, where your creations go live almost before you hit ‘publish’. That’s Gatsby for you. Inside its engine, it’s got GraphQL superpowers, making data dancing across your pages a breeze.
10 Best Next.js Alternatives to Consider Today
A React-based framework, Gatsby excels in crafting static websites renowned for their exceptional performance. Leveraging GraphQL, Gatsby efficiently pulls data from diverse sources, empowering developers to build dynamic, data-driven websites effortlessly. Its expansive plugin ecosystem allows seamless integration with various data providers, content management systems...
20 Best JavaScript Frameworks For 2023
Gatsby lets users pull data from any data source imaginable – CMS like WordPress, Drupal, Netlify, Contentful, etc., or APIs, databases, or simple markdown. Unlike Next.js, which we discussed above, Gatsby does not perform server-side rendering. Instead, it generates HTML content on the client side during build time. As a result, Gatsby delivers blazing-fast performance,...

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, GatsbyJS should be more popular than React-Static. It has been mentiond 16 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.

React-Static mentions (5)

  • Django 4.0 will include a built-in Redis cache back end
    Django is still my go-to. Specifically [Django-REST-Framework](https://www.django-rest-framework.org/) with a front-end written with [react-static](https://github.com/react-static/react-static). Django's ORM is so nice and the ecosystem around it rocks. Its biggest downside is painful upgrades. They don't really follow [semantic versioning](https://semver.org/). - Source: Hacker News / over 3 years ago
  • react-static: anyone using or have experience with this library?
    I found a reference to react-static which looks like a nice fit for a project I'm working on but there isn't much recent activity in the repo. I'm not sure if that means it's basically done and just works or if it has fallen out of maintenance. I see it's from Tanner Linsley so that's a good endorsement on its own but just wondering if anyone has used it for production code lately. Source: over 3 years ago
  • Static site generators to watch in 2021
    I still like react-static. Minimalism on react: https://github.com/react-static/react-static. - Source: Hacker News / almost 4 years ago
  • Nice repos/tools/posts - 1st April - #1
    Link : https://github.com/react-static/react-static. - Source: dev.to / about 4 years ago
  • How to create a single-page static site?
    Gatsby looks nice, but it is a no-go for reasons that I do not understand. The recommendation seems to include sapper, but svelte is not good for ClojureScript either, as it relies on mutable data. I could not find information about other alternatives to use with ClojureScript, like React-static. Source: about 4 years ago

GatsbyJS mentions (16)

  • React SEO: How to Build Search-Friendly Pages in React
    The most famous frameworks for developing SSR applications are Gatsby and Next.js. Although there are differences between them, their main goal is similar: to allow next-generation web applications to remain blazing-fast. - Source: dev.to / 30 days ago
  • External content for GatsbyJS
    If you enjoy React and want a standard-compliant and high performance web, you should look at GatsbyJS. - Source: dev.to / 9 months ago
  • Replatforming from Gatsby to Zola!
    Since around 2019 I have used Gatsby as my static site generator. Its plugin system makes it super feature extensible. It uses React under the hood which makes components easy to write and has tons of community support. Once I had a Gatsby site styled and running, publishing blog posts is fairly trivial:. - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • Build a Documentation Website with Gatsby in 10 Mins
    Smooth DOC is a ready-to-use Gatsby theme to create a documentation website. Creating a pro-quality website like this one takes weeks. Smooth DOC saves you time and lets you focus on the content. - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • Where to begin?
    I'd start with learning HTML and CSS first, then Javascript after those. There are a lot of free online resources for learning those. For websites, I use jekyll which is a great way to start off because there are a lot of community website templates that you can customize, which is great for beginners and learning. Then I'd recommend learning/moving to React. The Gatsby website generator would be good for React... Source: over 2 years ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing React-Static and GatsbyJS, you can also consider the following products

Refine - A React Framework for building internal tools, admin panels, dashboards & B2B apps with unmatched flexibilty.

Jekyll - Jekyll is a simple, blog aware, static site generator.

GitHub Personal Website Generator - Generate a personal website based on GitHub contributions

Hugo - Hugo is a general-purpose website framework for generating static web pages.

Blitz.js - Rails-like framework for React apps, built on Next.js

Ghost - Ghost is a fully open source, adaptable platform for building and running a modern online publication. We power blogs, magazines and journalists from Zappos to Sky News.