React Native vs Flutter: Which Cross-Platform Framework Wins?

Programming language:

React Native is written entirely in JavaScript thus; finding developers to code in JavaScript is easy whereas flutter is written in a language called Dart which is easy to pick up and is a good programming language but it does not have the popularity that JavaScript has. A developer opting for flutter would need to learn Dart.

Installation and setup:

The React Native framework can be installed by making use of the npm package manager with a simple one-line statement. But one needs to have Node.js and the npm package manager previously installed. Asides the framework, other device-specific tools are also needed for development, like the Android SDK and the JDK.

Whereas to install the Flutter framework, you need to visit the website and download the zipped folder, which is then to be extracted into the desired location. After this, you have to manually add the folder to the PATH variable.

Installation and setup are more complicated in a flutter as compared to React Native’s one-line install command.

UI Components::

Flutter makes use of it's a visual, structural, platform, and interactive widgets. These widgets are built-in UI components that replace native components.

Native, on the other hand, is based more on the native components both for Android and iOS.

Performance:

There is no JavaScript bridge for initiating interactions with the device native components, the speed of development and running time gets expedited drastically with Flutter. Connecting to native components is streamlined compared to React Native

Community support:

React Native has been around for almost four years now with developers around the world gradually adopting it.

Flutter on the other hand might not have a community as large as that of React Native due to its recent creation, but it is rapidly being adopted by developers globally.