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The best why-did-you-render alternatives

8 tools that do a similar job to why-did-you-render, 8 of them open source. Each entry says what it does and who it suits, so you can pick the one that fits instead of the most famous.

You're replacing

why-did-you-render

A development-only tool that logs React re-renders that may be avoidable, so you can find slow spots.

  1. 1

    React Scan

    Open source · MIT · ★ 21.9k

    Finds React components that re-render too often, highlighting them in your running app.

    Best for: Developers debugging slow React pages in development; Teams looking for unnecessary re-renders without reading every component

    Full review why-did-you-render vs React Scan
  2. 2

    Gifted Chat

    Open source · MIT · ★ 14.4k

    A ready-made chat screen component for React Native apps, with messages, replies, and reactions.

    Best for: Developers building a chat or messaging screen in a React Native app; Teams using Expo who want a drop-in chat interface

    Full review why-did-you-render vs Gifted Chat
  3. 3

    TanStack Query

    Open source · MIT · ★ 50.5k

    A library for fetching, caching, and updating data from servers in web apps.

    Best for: Frontend developers building apps that load data from a server; Teams using React, Solid, Svelte, or Vue who want less hand-written loading and caching code

    Full review why-did-you-render vs TanStack Query
  4. 4

    react-virtualized

    Open source · MIT · ★ 27.1k

    React components for efficiently rendering large lists and tabular data.

    Best for: React developers who need to display long lists of items; Teams building data tables or grids with many rows

    Full review
  5. 5

    Million.js

    Open source · MIT · ★ 17.7k

    An optimizing compiler that speeds up React components by skipping most of React's diffing work.

    Best for: React developers whose apps have many elements that update often; Teams looking for a performance boost without rewriting their components

    Full review
  6. 6

    Inferno

    Open source · MIT · ★ 16.5k

    A fast, React-like JavaScript library for building user interfaces in the browser and on servers.

    Best for: Developers already familiar with React who want a React-like API; Projects that re-render frequently with real-time data or large DOM trees

    Full review
  7. 7

    SWR

    Open source · MIT · ★ 32.5k

    A React hook library for fetching data, with caching and automatic refresh.

    Best for: React developers who fetch data from APIs in components; Projects that want built-in caching and request deduplication

    Full review
  8. 8

    react-i18next

    Open source · MIT · ★ 10.1k

    Adds translation support to React apps, built on the i18next ecosystem.

    Best for: React developers who need their app available in several languages; Teams already using the i18next ecosystem or planning to support server-side i18next too

    Full review

How we pick: tools in the same category that solve the same problem, projects that name each other as alternatives, and open-source projects that describe themselves as an alternative to why-did-you-render. We don't take payment for placement.