zustand vs recoil vs react-sweet-state
State Management Libraries in React Comparison
1 Year
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What's State Management Libraries in React?

State management libraries in React are tools that help manage the state of components in a React application. They provide a centralized way to store, update, and access data across components, making it easier to maintain and scale the application. These libraries offer different approaches and features to handle state management efficiently.

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zustand6,592,19051,56389.2 kB73 months agoMIT
recoil519,94119,6192.21 MB3242 years agoMIT
react-sweet-state15,218-131 kB-8 months agoMIT
Feature Comparison: zustand vs recoil vs react-sweet-state

Local State Management

  • zustand:

    zustand allows you to manage local component state using a hook-based API that simplifies state management. It provides a lightweight and performant solution for handling local state in React components.

  • recoil:

    Recoil offers support for managing local component state with atoms, which are units of state that can be shared across components. Atoms provide a simple and efficient way to handle local state within a component.

  • react-sweet-state:

    react-sweet-state provides an easy way to manage local component state using hooks and context API. It allows you to define and update local state within a component without the need for external libraries or complex setup.

Global State Management

  • zustand:

    zustand supports global state management by providing a flexible and lightweight approach to managing shared state across components. It allows you to create and update global state with ease using custom hooks and automatic memoization.

  • recoil:

    Recoil specializes in managing global state in React applications, providing features like selectors for derived state and asynchronous state updates. It offers a scalable solution for handling complex state at the application level.

  • react-sweet-state:

    react-sweet-state offers global state management capabilities with a simple and intuitive API. It allows you to create and update global state that can be shared across multiple components in a React application.

Performance Optimization

  • zustand:

    zustand prioritizes performance optimization by offering automatic memoization and efficient state updates. It is built with simplicity and performance in mind, making it a suitable choice for applications that require fast and responsive state management.

  • recoil:

    Recoil is designed for performance optimization in large-scale applications, with features like automatic memoization and asynchronous state updates. It aims to provide efficient state management solutions that scale well with complex application structures.

  • react-sweet-state:

    react-sweet-state focuses on simplicity and ease of use, which can lead to better performance in smaller applications. It offers middleware support for optimizing state updates and provides a clean and concise API for managing state.

Developer Experience

  • zustand:

    zustand enhances developer experience by providing a minimalistic and easy-to-use API for state management. It offers a lightweight solution with automatic memoization and custom hook creation for a seamless development experience.

  • recoil:

    Recoil focuses on enhancing developer experience by offering tools for managing complex state in a clear and efficient way. It provides features like selectors for derived state and asynchronous updates to simplify state management tasks.

  • react-sweet-state:

    react-sweet-state aims to improve developer experience by providing a simple and declarative API for managing state. It offers easy integration with React components and hooks, making it intuitive to use and maintain.

Community Support

  • zustand:

    zustand has a supportive community of users who contribute to the library's development and provide assistance to fellow developers. It has an active GitHub repository and documentation to help users understand and use the library effectively.

  • recoil:

    Recoil is backed by Facebook, the creators of React, which ensures strong community support and ongoing development. It has a dedicated team working on the library and regular updates to improve performance and features.

  • react-sweet-state:

    react-sweet-state has a growing community of users and contributors who actively support and contribute to the library. It has a dedicated GitHub repository and documentation to help users get started and troubleshoot issues.

How to Choose: zustand vs recoil vs react-sweet-state
  • zustand:

    Choose zustand if you prefer a lightweight and minimalistic state management library with a focus on simplicity and performance. Zustand offers a hook-based API for managing state, with features like automatic memoization, easy integration with React components, and support for creating custom hooks for specific state management needs.

  • recoil:

    Choose recoil if you need a state management library specifically designed for managing complex and global state in React applications. Recoil provides features like atoms for state management, selectors for derived state, and asynchronous state updates. It focuses on performance and scalability for large-scale applications.

  • react-sweet-state:

    Choose react-sweet-state if you prefer a simple and flexible state management solution with built-in support for hooks and context API. It offers a declarative way to manage state and provides features like local and global state management, middleware support, and easy integration with React components.

README for zustand

Build Status Build Size Version Downloads Discord Shield

A small, fast and scalable bearbones state-management solution using simplified flux principles. Has a comfy API based on hooks, isn't boilerplatey or opinionated.

Don't disregard it because it's cute. It has quite the claws, lots of time was spent dealing with common pitfalls, like the dreaded zombie child problem, react concurrency, and context loss between mixed renderers. It may be the one state-manager in the React space that gets all of these right.

You can try a live demo here.

npm install zustand

:warning: This readme is written for JavaScript users. If you are a TypeScript user, be sure to check out our TypeScript Usage section.

First create a store

Your store is a hook! You can put anything in it: primitives, objects, functions. State has to be updated immutably and the set function merges state to help it.

import { create } from 'zustand'

const useBearStore = create((set) => ({
  bears: 0,
  increasePopulation: () => set((state) => ({ bears: state.bears + 1 })),
  removeAllBears: () => set({ bears: 0 }),
}))

Then bind your components, and that's it!

Use the hook anywhere, no providers are needed. Select your state and the component will re-render on changes.

function BearCounter() {
  const bears = useBearStore((state) => state.bears)
  return <h1>{bears} around here ...</h1>
}

function Controls() {
  const increasePopulation = useBearStore((state) => state.increasePopulation)
  return <button onClick={increasePopulation}>one up</button>
}

Why zustand over redux?

Why zustand over context?

  • Less boilerplate
  • Renders components only on changes
  • Centralized, action-based state management

Recipes

Fetching everything

You can, but bear in mind that it will cause the component to update on every state change!

const state = useBearStore()

Selecting multiple state slices

It detects changes with strict-equality (old === new) by default, this is efficient for atomic state picks.

const nuts = useBearStore((state) => state.nuts)
const honey = useBearStore((state) => state.honey)

If you want to construct a single object with multiple state-picks inside, similar to redux's mapStateToProps, you can use useShallow to prevent unnecessary rerenders when the selector output does not change according to shallow equal.

import { create } from 'zustand'
import { useShallow } from 'zustand/react/shallow'

const useBearStore = create((set) => ({
  nuts: 0,
  honey: 0,
  treats: {},
  // ...
}))

// Object pick, re-renders the component when either state.nuts or state.honey change
const { nuts, honey } = useBearStore(
  useShallow((state) => ({ nuts: state.nuts, honey: state.honey })),
)

// Array pick, re-renders the component when either state.nuts or state.honey change
const [nuts, honey] = useBearStore(
  useShallow((state) => [state.nuts, state.honey]),
)

// Mapped picks, re-renders the component when state.treats changes in order, count or keys
const treats = useBearStore(useShallow((state) => Object.keys(state.treats)))

For more control over re-rendering, you may provide any custom equality function (this example requires the use of createWithEqualityFn).

const treats = useBearStore(
  (state) => state.treats,
  (oldTreats, newTreats) => compare(oldTreats, newTreats),
)

Overwriting state

The set function has a second argument, false by default. Instead of merging, it will replace the state model. Be careful not to wipe out parts you rely on, like actions.

import omit from 'lodash-es/omit'

const useFishStore = create((set) => ({
  salmon: 1,
  tuna: 2,
  deleteEverything: () => set({}, true), // clears the entire store, actions included
  deleteTuna: () => set((state) => omit(state, ['tuna']), true),
}))

Async actions

Just call set when you're ready, zustand doesn't care if your actions are async or not.

const useFishStore = create((set) => ({
  fishies: {},
  fetch: async (pond) => {
    const response = await fetch(pond)
    set({ fishies: await response.json() })
  },
}))

Read from state in actions

set allows fn-updates set(state => result), but you still have access to state outside of it through get.

const useSoundStore = create((set, get) => ({
  sound: 'grunt',
  action: () => {
    const sound = get().sound
    ...

Reading/writing state and reacting to changes outside of components

Sometimes you need to access state in a non-reactive way or act upon the store. For these cases, the resulting hook has utility functions attached to its prototype.

:warning: This technique is not recommended for adding state in React Server Components (typically in Next.js 13 and above). It can lead to unexpected bugs and privacy issues for your users. For more details, see #2200.

const useDogStore = create(() => ({ paw: true, snout: true, fur: true }))

// Getting non-reactive fresh state
const paw = useDogStore.getState().paw
// Listening to all changes, fires synchronously on every change
const unsub1 = useDogStore.subscribe(console.log)
// Updating state, will trigger listeners
useDogStore.setState({ paw: false })
// Unsubscribe listeners
unsub1()

// You can of course use the hook as you always would
function Component() {
  const paw = useDogStore((state) => state.paw)
  ...

Using subscribe with selector

If you need to subscribe with a selector, subscribeWithSelector middleware will help.

With this middleware subscribe accepts an additional signature:

subscribe(selector, callback, options?: { equalityFn, fireImmediately }): Unsubscribe
import { subscribeWithSelector } from 'zustand/middleware'
const useDogStore = create(
  subscribeWithSelector(() => ({ paw: true, snout: true, fur: true })),
)

// Listening to selected changes, in this case when "paw" changes
const unsub2 = useDogStore.subscribe((state) => state.paw, console.log)
// Subscribe also exposes the previous value
const unsub3 = useDogStore.subscribe(
  (state) => state.paw,
  (paw, previousPaw) => console.log(paw, previousPaw),
)
// Subscribe also supports an optional equality function
const unsub4 = useDogStore.subscribe(
  (state) => [state.paw, state.fur],
  console.log,
  { equalityFn: shallow },
)
// Subscribe and fire immediately
const unsub5 = useDogStore.subscribe((state) => state.paw, console.log, {
  fireImmediately: true,
})

Using zustand without React

Zustand core can be imported and used without the React dependency. The only difference is that the create function does not return a hook, but the API utilities.

import { createStore } from 'zustand/vanilla'

const store = createStore((set) => ...)
const { getState, setState, subscribe, getInitialState } = store

export default store

You can use a vanilla store with useStore hook available since v4.

import { useStore } from 'zustand'
import { vanillaStore } from './vanillaStore'

const useBoundStore = (selector) => useStore(vanillaStore, selector)

:warning: Note that middlewares that modify set or get are not applied to getState and setState.

Transient updates (for often occurring state-changes)

The subscribe function allows components to bind to a state-portion without forcing re-render on changes. Best combine it with useEffect for automatic unsubscribe on unmount. This can make a drastic performance impact when you are allowed to mutate the view directly.

const useScratchStore = create((set) => ({ scratches: 0, ... }))

const Component = () => {
  // Fetch initial state
  const scratchRef = useRef(useScratchStore.getState().scratches)
  // Connect to the store on mount, disconnect on unmount, catch state-changes in a reference
  useEffect(() => useScratchStore.subscribe(
    state => (scratchRef.current = state.scratches)
  ), [])
  ...

Sick of reducers and changing nested states? Use Immer!

Reducing nested structures is tiresome. Have you tried immer?

import { produce } from 'immer'

const useLushStore = create((set) => ({
  lush: { forest: { contains: { a: 'bear' } } },
  clearForest: () =>
    set(
      produce((state) => {
        state.lush.forest.contains = null
      }),
    ),
}))

const clearForest = useLushStore((state) => state.clearForest)
clearForest()

Alternatively, there are some other solutions.

Persist middleware

You can persist your store's data using any kind of storage.

import { create } from 'zustand'
import { persist, createJSONStorage } from 'zustand/middleware'

const useFishStore = create(
  persist(
    (set, get) => ({
      fishes: 0,
      addAFish: () => set({ fishes: get().fishes + 1 }),
    }),
    {
      name: 'food-storage', // name of the item in the storage (must be unique)
      storage: createJSONStorage(() => sessionStorage), // (optional) by default, 'localStorage' is used
    },
  ),
)

See the full documentation for this middleware.

Immer middleware

Immer is available as middleware too.

import { create } from 'zustand'
import { immer } from 'zustand/middleware/immer'

const useBeeStore = create(
  immer((set) => ({
    bees: 0,
    addBees: (by) =>
      set((state) => {
        state.bees += by
      }),
  })),
)

Can't live without redux-like reducers and action types?

const types = { increase: 'INCREASE', decrease: 'DECREASE' }

const reducer = (state, { type, by = 1 }) => {
  switch (type) {
    case types.increase:
      return { grumpiness: state.grumpiness + by }
    case types.decrease:
      return { grumpiness: state.grumpiness - by }
  }
}

const useGrumpyStore = create((set) => ({
  grumpiness: 0,
  dispatch: (args) => set((state) => reducer(state, args)),
}))

const dispatch = useGrumpyStore((state) => state.dispatch)
dispatch({ type: types.increase, by: 2 })

Or, just use our redux-middleware. It wires up your main-reducer, sets the initial state, and adds a dispatch function to the state itself and the vanilla API.

import { redux } from 'zustand/middleware'

const useGrumpyStore = create(redux(reducer, initialState))

Redux devtools

Install the Redux DevTools Chrome extension to use the devtools middleware.

import { devtools } from 'zustand/middleware'

// Usage with a plain action store, it will log actions as "setState"
const usePlainStore = create(devtools((set) => ...))
// Usage with a redux store, it will log full action types
const useReduxStore = create(devtools(redux(reducer, initialState)))

One redux devtools connection for multiple stores

import { devtools } from 'zustand/middleware'

// Usage with a plain action store, it will log actions as "setState"
const usePlainStore1 = create(devtools((set) => ..., { name, store: storeName1 }))
const usePlainStore2 = create(devtools((set) => ..., { name, store: storeName2 }))
// Usage with a redux store, it will log full action types
const useReduxStore = create(devtools(redux(reducer, initialState)), , { name, store: storeName3 })
const useReduxStore = create(devtools(redux(reducer, initialState)), , { name, store: storeName4 })

Assigning different connection names will separate stores in redux devtools. This also helps group different stores into separate redux devtools connections.

devtools takes the store function as its first argument, optionally you can name the store or configure serialize options with a second argument.

Name store: devtools(..., {name: "MyStore"}), which will create a separate instance named "MyStore" in the devtools.

Serialize options: devtools(..., { serialize: { options: true } }).

Logging Actions

devtools will only log actions from each separated store unlike in a typical combined reducers redux store. See an approach to combining stores https://github.com/pmndrs/zustand/issues/163

You can log a specific action type for each set function by passing a third parameter:

const useBearStore = create(devtools((set) => ({
  ...
  eatFish: () => set(
    (prev) => ({ fishes: prev.fishes > 1 ? prev.fishes - 1 : 0 }),
    undefined,
    'bear/eatFish'
  ),
  ...

You can also log the action's type along with its payload:

  ...
  addFishes: (count) => set(
    (prev) => ({ fishes: prev.fishes + count }),
    undefined,
    { type: 'bear/addFishes', count, }
  ),
  ...

If an action type is not provided, it is defaulted to "anonymous". You can customize this default value by providing an anonymousActionType parameter:

devtools(..., { anonymousActionType: 'unknown', ... })

If you wish to disable devtools (on production for instance). You can customize this setting by providing the enabled parameter:

devtools(..., { enabled: false, ... })

React context

The store created with create doesn't require context providers. In some cases, you may want to use contexts for dependency injection or if you want to initialize your store with props from a component. Because the normal store is a hook, passing it as a normal context value may violate the rules of hooks.

The recommended method available since v4 is to use the vanilla store.

import { createContext, useContext } from 'react'
import { createStore, useStore } from 'zustand'

const store = createStore(...) // vanilla store without hooks

const StoreContext = createContext()

const App = () => (
  <StoreContext.Provider value={store}>
    ...
  </StoreContext.Provider>
)

const Component = () => {
  const store = useContext(StoreContext)
  const slice = useStore(store, selector)
  ...

TypeScript Usage

Basic typescript usage doesn't require anything special except for writing create<State>()(...) instead of create(...)...

import { create } from 'zustand'
import { devtools, persist } from 'zustand/middleware'
import type {} from '@redux-devtools/extension' // required for devtools typing

interface BearState {
  bears: number
  increase: (by: number) => void
}

const useBearStore = create<BearState>()(
  devtools(
    persist(
      (set) => ({
        bears: 0,
        increase: (by) => set((state) => ({ bears: state.bears + by })),
      }),
      {
        name: 'bear-storage',
      },
    ),
  ),
)

A more complete TypeScript guide is here.

Best practices

Third-Party Libraries

Some users may want to extend Zustand's feature set which can be done using third-party libraries made by the community. For information regarding third-party libraries with Zustand, visit the doc.

Comparison with other libraries