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unpkg VS Google Hosted Libraries

Compare unpkg VS Google Hosted Libraries and see what are their differences

unpkg logo unpkg

The CDN for everything on npm

Google Hosted Libraries logo Google Hosted Libraries

A stable, reliable, high-speed, globally available content distribution network for the most popular open-source JavaScript libraries.
  • unpkg Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-07-18
  • Google Hosted Libraries Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-06-24

unpkg features and specs

  • Ease of Use
    Unpkg provides a simple and straightforward way to include any npm package in a web project by directly using a URL, without additional setup or configuration.
  • CDN Performance
    Being a Content Delivery Network (CDN), unpkg ensures fast and reliable delivery of assets, as files are served from locations closest to the user geographically.
  • Automatic Updates
    With unpkg, you can link directly to a package's latest version, ensuring your project always uses the most up-to-date version available.
  • Broad Compatibility
    Unpkg works with any package on npm, providing access to a vast library of JavaScript modules and assets that can be easily integrated into web applications.

Possible disadvantages of unpkg

  • Version Control
    Relying on automatic updates can introduce breaking changes due to version mismatches, potentially leading to unstable builds or unexpected behavior.
  • Single Point of Failure
    If unpkg's server experiences downtime or issues, your application could be disrupted, since dependencies are served from this external source.
  • Lack of Customization
    Unpkg does not support certain custom configurations or optimizations that might be possible with local bundling tools or custom CDNs.
  • Security Concerns
    Serving third-party scripts directly from a CDN could introduce security vulnerabilities if the integrity and authenticity of the scripts are not properly verified.

Google Hosted Libraries features and specs

  • Improved Load Speed
    Google Hosted Libraries are distributed via Google's global Content Delivery Network (CDN), which can deliver assets to users with minimal latency by caching them at data centers worldwide. This often results in faster load times compared to hosting libraries on your own server.
  • Better Caching
    Using a common source like Google Hosted Libraries means that users are more likely to have cached copies of these libraries from visiting other sites, reducing load time for returning users who have already downloaded the files.
  • Reliability
    Google's infrastructure is reliable and highly available, reducing the risk of downtime and ensuring that libraries are served to end-users efficiently and consistently.
  • Version Management
    Developers can include specific version numbers in the URLs, ensuring that their applications can easily upgrade or downgrade a library version if needed, allowing for better version control management.
  • Reduced Server Load
    Offloading the delivery of these libraries to Google reduces the bandwidth and load on your own servers, potentially lowering hosting costs and improving your site's overall performance.

Possible disadvantages of Google Hosted Libraries

  • Dependency on Third Party
    Relying on Google for serving these libraries means your application's uptime is partially dependent on a third party, which may introduce risks if Google's services experience issues.
  • Privacy Concerns
    Using Google Hosted Libraries means that user data may be shared with Google whenever these resources are fetched, which could raise privacy concerns depending on your user base and regulatory environment.
  • Limited Customization
    Because these libraries are hosted externally, there is limited opportunity to customize or modify them to fit specific project needs without hosting your own version.
  • Internet Requirement
    If a user is offline or if Google's servers are unreachable for some reason, your application may fail to load these libraries unless you have local fallbacks or entire offline support.

unpkg videos

072 Generating the Unpkg URL

More videos:

Google Hosted Libraries videos

Why you should use Google Hosted libraries!

More videos:

  • Review - Google Hosted Libraries

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to unpkg and Google Hosted Libraries)
CDN
71 71%
29% 29
Developer Tools
100 100%
0% 0
Cloud Computing
61 61%
39% 39
Image Optimisation
51 51%
49% 49

User comments

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Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, unpkg should be more popular than Google Hosted Libraries. It has been mentiond 31 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.

unpkg mentions (31)

  • Shadow DOM: Master Web Component Encapsulation for Modern JavaScript Apps
    // Feature detection and polyfill loading (function() { // Check if Shadow DOM is supported if (!('attachShadow' in Element.prototype)) { console.log('Shadow DOM not supported - loading polyfill'); // Load the polyfill const script = document.createElement('script'); script.src = 'https://unpkg.com/@webcomponents/webcomponentsjs/webcomponents-bundle.js'; script.onload = () => { ... - Source: dev.to / 2 months ago
  • CSS-zero: opinionated CSS starter kit for your "nobuild" application
    Bold move to call it "no build" when it requires me to install Ruby, Rails and this package. Not to mention that if I really want a "no build" tailwind I could simply add this single line: - Source: Hacker News / 3 months ago
  • trimMiddle() - the missing String trim command
    To use it in your own products, either use npm -​i trimmiddle or use the client-side version via unpkg. - Source: dev.to / 5 months ago
  • Comprehensive Guide: Integrating a Drag-and-Drop Form Builder for Camunda.
    Const formEngine = document.createElement('script'); formEngine.crossOrigin = true; formEngine.src = 'https://unpkg.com/@react-form-builder/viewer-bundle@1.2.0/dist/index.umd.js'; document.body.append(formEngine);. - Source: dev.to / 12 months ago
  • Run0 – systemd based alternative to sudo announced
    Just a short reminder that Lennart is working for Microsoft. https://unpkg.com/@material-design-icons/svg@0.14.13/outlined/refresh.svg. - Source: Hacker News / about 1 year ago
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Google Hosted Libraries mentions (7)

  • Unpkg CDN down causing dependent website outages
    I'd imagine for many developers, the probability of something like Google's Hosted Libraries (https://developers.google.com/speed/libraries) going down or being hacked is far, far lower than the probability of their own site hosting having a problem. - Source: Hacker News / about 1 year ago
  • A list of SaaS, PaaS and IaaS offerings that have free tiers of interest to devops and infradev
    Developers.google.com — The Google Hosted Libraries is a content distribution network for the most popular Open Source JavaScript libraries. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
  • Closure Compiler, JSDOC, Polymer, Lit and apps script
    To make things worse, I can't even find about Polymer or Lit on this list: Https://developers.google.com/speed/libraries. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Apps Script Observable
    I am looking in the hosted libraries: https://developers.google.com/speed/libraries And found that they have Indefinite Observable, the thing is, as far I know Promisses don't work with apps script web app. But Observables work? Source: over 2 years ago
  • Public CDN's aren't useful anymore
    Public CDN’s were supposed to help page speed, but things have changed in 2019. Services like Google Fonts, Cloudflare’s cdnjs, jsDelivr and Google Hosted Libraries may not help make sites load faster anymore. - Source: dev.to / about 3 years ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing unpkg and Google Hosted Libraries, you can also consider the following products

jsDelivr - A free, fast, and reliable Open Source CDN for npm and GitHub with the largest network and best performance from all OSS CDNs. Serving 100 billion requests per month.

cdnjs - An open source community driven JS/CSS CDN.

Yandex CDN - Разработчики сайтов могут загружать различные JavaScript-фреймворки и библиотеки с открытым исходным кодом с серверов Яндекса по постоянным ссылкам.

raw.githack.com - raw.githack.com serves raw files from github.com with proper Content-Type headers (like rawgit.

Amazon CloudFront - Amazon CloudFront is a content delivery web service.

Vercel - Vercel is the platform for frontend developers, providing the speed and reliability innovators need to create at the moment of inspiration.