Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

vert.x VS Grails

Compare vert.x VS Grails and see what are their differences

vert.x logo vert.x

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Grails logo Grails

An Open Source, full stack, web application framework for the JVM
  • vert.x Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-06-12
  • Grails Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-10-17

vert.x features and specs

  • Performance
    Vert.x is designed to be highly performant, leveraging a non-blocking, event-driven architecture which makes it suitable for handling many concurrent requests efficiently.
  • Polyglot
    Vert.x supports multiple programming languages, including Java, Kotlin, JavaScript, Groovy, Ruby, and more. This allows developers to use the language they are most comfortable with.
  • Modular
    Vert.x is modular and lightweight, enabling developers to use only the parts they need and easily integrate with other libraries and tools.
  • Reactive Ecosystem
    Vert.x provides a robust ecosystem for building reactive applications, including asynchronous APIs, event bus, and reactive streams.
  • Scalability
    The architecture of Vert.x allows for easy scaling both vertically and horizontally, as it can efficiently manage resources and load balancing.

Possible disadvantages of vert.x

  • Learning Curve
    The event-driven and asynchronous nature of Vert.x can be challenging for developers who are accustomed to traditional synchronous programming paradigms.
  • Community and Resources
    While growing, the Vert.x community is smaller compared to more established frameworks, which may result in fewer resources, tutorials, and third-party integrations.
  • Complexity
    As applications grow in size, managing asynchronous code and callback structures can become complex, requiring careful planning and architecture decisions.
  • Tooling
    Tooling support, while improving, may not be as comprehensive as other established frameworks, which might impact development speed and debugging.

Grails features and specs

  • Rapid Development
    Grails promotes rapid development through its convention-over-configuration approach and powerful features, like scaffolding and GORM (Grails Object Relational Mapping), which speed up the coding process significantly.
  • Groovy Language Integration
    Being built on Groovy, a dynamic language for the Java platform, Grails provides the flexibility and expressiveness of Groovy while maintaining compatibility with Java libraries and tools.
  • Spring Boot Foundation
    Grails is built on top of Spring Boot, leveraging its robust dependency injection, security, and configuration management capabilities, which ensures the stability and scalability of applications.
  • Plugin Ecosystem
    Grails offers a rich ecosystem of plugins for extending the framework. This allows developers to easily integrate various functionalities without reinventing the wheel.
  • Convention-over-Configuration
    The framework emphasizes conventions for many aspects of the development process, reducing the need for extensive configuration and allowing developers to focus more on business logic.
  • Strong Community and Documentation
    Grails has a strong community and extensive documentation, which make it easier for developers to find solutions to problems, share knowledge, and get support.

Possible disadvantages of Grails

  • Learning Curve
    Despite its many conveniences, Grails has a steep learning curve, particularly for developers not familiar with Groovy or the underlying Spring framework.
  • Performance Overheads
    The abstraction layers and dynamic aspects of Groovy may introduce performance overheads, making Grails applications potentially slower than those built with more streamlined frameworks.
  • Limited Flexibility
    While Grails' conventions can be beneficial, they can also limit flexibility, forcing developers into certain patterns and practices even when they may not be ideal for all scenarios.
  • Less Popularity
    Compared to other frameworks like Spring Boot alone or Hibernate, Grails has a smaller market share, leading to fewer job opportunities and a smaller pool of resources.
  • Complex Debugging
    The dynamic nature of Groovy can sometimes make debugging more complex and challenging, especially for those accustomed to statically-typed languages like Java.
  • Dependency Management Issues
    Managing dependencies in Grails can occasionally be problematic, particularly when dealing with transitive dependencies or conflicts between plugins.

vert.x videos

From Zero to Back End in 45 Minutes with Eclipse Vert.x

Grails videos

BUYING MY SNEAKER GRAILS ON STOCKX!

More videos:

  • Review - TOP 5 SNEAKER GRAILS
  • Review - Top 5 Grails with Superpower Review | Berkfamily54comics

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to vert.x and Grails)
Web Frameworks
26 26%
74% 74
Developer Tools
14 14%
86% 86
Runtime
100 100%
0% 0
Python Web Framework
18 18%
82% 82

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare vert.x and Grails

vert.x Reviews

17 Popular Java Frameworks for 2023: Pros, cons, and more
As Vert.x is an event-driven and non-blocking framework, it can handle a lot of concurrencies using only a minimal number of threads. Vert.x is also quite lightweight, with the core framework weighing only about 650 KB. It has a modular architecture that allows you to use only the modules you need so that your app can stay as slick as possible. Vert.x is an ideal choice if...
Source: raygun.com

Grails Reviews

17 Popular Java Frameworks for 2023: Pros, cons, and more
Although you have to write your code in Groovy, Grails works well with other Java-related technologies such as the Java Development Kit, Jakarta EE containers, Hibernate, and Spring. Under the hood, Grails is built on top of Spring Boot to make use of its productivity-friendly features like dependency injection. With Grails, you can achieve the same results with much less...
Source: raygun.com
10 Best Java Frameworks You Should Know
Grails is a web application framework developed using Apache Groovy Language. It is a Framework that follows the coding by convention method which provides a Standalone environment. Also, it supports instance development with no configuration required.

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, vert.x should be more popular than Grails. It has been mentiond 29 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.

vert.x mentions (29)

  • Java News: WildFly 36, Spring Milestones, and Open Liberty Updates
    The sixth release candidate of Eclipse Vert.x 5.0.0 provides support for the Java Platform Module System and a new VerticleBase class. Further details are available in the release notes. - Source: dev.to / 16 days ago
  • Rust, C++, and Python trends in jobs on Hacker News (February 2025)
    I see your point, but I still don't think you can just say "If you want to get get a job as a Go developer, you must know gRPC." Even more so for Kafka, I've only heard about it being popular in the Java world. You can't even say "If you want to get a job as a Java developer, you must know Spring." Nowadays, sane Java projects use https://vertx.io, it's just too good. I would argue that Spring is for legacy... - Source: Hacker News / 2 months ago
  • Error handlers and failure handlers in Vert.x
    Vert.x is a toolkit for developing reactive applications on the JVM. I wrote a short introductory post about it earlier, when I used it for a commercial project. I had to revisit a Vert.x-based hobby project a few weeks ago, and I learned that there were some gaps in my knowledge about how Vert.x handles failures and errors. To fill those gaps, I did some experiments, wrote a few tests, and then wrote this blog post. - Source: dev.to / 5 months ago
  • Spark – A web micro framework for Java and Kotlin
    Https://vertx.io/ It's actively maintained with full time developers, performant, supports Kotlin out of the box, and has more features? - Source: Hacker News / about 1 year ago
  • Reactive database access on the JVM
    Hibernate Reactive integrates with Vert.x, but an extension allows to bridge to Project Reactor if wanted. - Source: dev.to / almost 2 years ago
View more

Grails mentions (6)

  • Mastering Node.js
    Trails is a modern web application framework. It builds on the pedigree of Rails and Grails to accelerate development by adhering to a straightforward, convention-based, API-driven design philosophy. - Source: dev.to / 10 months ago
  • RIFE2 web framework under development
    And frameworks like Grails build conventions and helpers on top of Spring. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Web app in Java with Template Engine
    I don't have any direct experience and am only suggesting it because you mentioned RoR...But Grails (https://grails.org/) is basically the JVM version of RoR (Groovy on Rails -> Grails). Source: over 2 years ago
  • Libraries other than Spring Boot for creating web APIs
    Grails - Spring under the hood. Much less boilerplate. Opinionated, which helps keep things consistent. Uses Spring-Security plugin for authentication. Source: almost 3 years ago
  • "get-it-done" MVC web framework like Django in Java?
    Also, Grails, which a Rails like framework build on Groovy, a JVM scripting language. Source: over 3 years ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing vert.x and Grails, you can also consider the following products

Micronaut Framework - Build modular easily testable microservice & serverless apps

Ruby on Rails - Ruby on Rails is an open source full-stack web application framework for the Ruby programming...

Javalin - Simple REST APIs for Java and Kotlin

Django - The Web framework for perfectionists with deadlines

helidon - Helidon Project, Java libraries crafted for Microservices

Meteor - Meteor is a set of new technologies for building top-quality web apps in a fraction of the time.