Looking back to the web development arena, JavaScript has come a long way and has become the most wildly popular programming language on the earth.
What was once only used for basic web designing, has now become the most important programming language of today and tomorrow.
Today, leading JavaScript frameworks like Node JS are supporting thousands of startups and businesses to earn millions of dollars in revenue.
Node JS is a JavaScript runtime environment that can sustain a huge load while providing the same level of smooth performance.
Ever since its inception, Node JS team has continuously pushed out frequent updates and by the looks of it, Node JS isn’t going to stop any time soon.
So, in this blog, we’ll celebrate the Node JS’s achievement by sharing the best Node JS libraries to consider for building Node JS applications.
7 Best Node JS Libraries
Before we begin, let us define what we mean by “best” Node JS libraries. That’s because the list of best Node JS libraries may differ depending on your perspective.
In this post, “Best” simply means a Node JS library is best compared to others for a specific purpose.
For instance, you might expect a Node JS library/package like Yargs included in this list because it’s one of the highly downloaded. But, and spoiler alert, it’s not.
We have only listed Node JS libraries that we know for sure are best for a specific purpose compared to other similar Node JS libraries.
That being said, let’s dive right in!
1 – Express
Express is although a JavaScript framework, but it also works as a library in Node JS. In fact, Express is one of the leading Node JS libraries for quickly developing web applications and APIs.
What sets Express apart from other similar Node JS libraries is its minimal structure. It gives a solid outline to Node JS developers for quickly building functional web applications.
It’s for this reason, many well-known companies like IBM, Uber, and many others have adopted it in their production.
2 – Async.js
Originally built to use with Node JS, Async is actually a utility module that provides over 20 powerful functions to increase the performance of a Node JS application by eliminating the render-blocking JavaScript.
Render-blocking is basically responsible for not loading any JavaScript content placed in ‘above the fold’ part of a page until the JavaScript itself has finished loading in a web page.
As a result, it affects the performance of a website.
This is where Async.js comes into the picture. With Async.js, you can load all JavaScript content alongside every other part of a web page faster than render-blocking.
In fact, Asynchronous has reinvented the way JavaScript interact with web applications.
3 – Request – Simplified HTTP Client
Modern-day web applications often require dealing with external HTTP calls for loading or fetching data from different external sources.
Therefore, it’s critical to have a reliable way to perform HTTP calls.
Request, a simplified HTTP client, is the most reliable HTTP client libraries that are out there.
With Request library, you can make a large number of HTTP calls easily, reliably, and securely to access content and data from external sources on the web.
4 – Socket.IO
Imagine a scenario where you had access to tools that can help you build a real-time Analytics application just as powerful as Google Analytics is today.
Socket.io allows you to build truly powerful and real-time applications where you can stream data or content directly externally through APIs.
One popular example where Socket.io has been used in a Twitter bot for collecting the latest news. Besides this Twitter bot, there are over thousands of companies including Trello and Banksalad using Socket.io to integrate real-time functionality in their applications.
5 – Underscore
Underscore is a popular Node JS library that offers a multitude of useful functional programming helpers.
In simple words, Underscore makes the web application development process a much more enjoyable affair through its rapid development workflow and also the programming helpers.
There are over 100 functional programming helpers embedded in the Underscore that fills the gap from opening an HTML document to writing code without having to worry about how complex functions operate.
6 – PM2
Node JS framework is often recommended when it comes to building large-scale applications.
But Node JS alone cannot do everything to build a successful large-scale application. Along with the Node JS, you also have to have proper process management.
PM2 offers both, proper process management and a load balancer to help with performance tweaks.
Simply put, PM2 gives you the tools to reload apps without any downtime, making your application stay online indefinitely.
7 – UglifyJS2
Performance is an important factor when it comes to building successful web applications. The more performance you can squeeze out, the faster your application is going to be.
Tech giants like Google have often talked about how, even a millisecond of performance increase, can gain you more business.
This is where UglifyJS2 comes into the picture.
UglifyJS2 basically helps Node JS developers to minify and trim your JavaScript files automatically, which can ultimately have a huge impact on your overall application’s performance.
Apart from this, UglifyJS2 also easy-to-use, flexible, and helps to saves those little bits of space and load-times so that you can gain the performance margins your application needs.
Conclusion
With this, we’ve now finally listed the 7 best Node JS libraries to build Node JS applications. If you happen to be a Node JS developer, we would love to hear your thoughts on this list down in the comment section below.
On the other hand, if you’re a business or company looking to hire Node JS developer for your next project, we can help you build top-notch applications, just like we’ve done for world-class brands like Cisco, Samsung, and many others.
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