10 Best React Developer Tools (to Speed Up React Development)

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By: Sagar Sharma

10 Best React Developer Tools (to Speed Up React Development)

Invented in 2013 by Facebook, React started its journey as a JavaScript library that allows engineers to create highly dynamic user interfaces. But have you ever experienced the development capabilities of React?

Yes, React could be an amazing platform that develops more proactive and powerful mobile and web apps. There are around 30 to 40 different react developer tools that played a major role in making the react highly used and reliable.

Using React components, developers can build reusable and isolated blocks to create different applications. Beyond software solutions development, the tools help engineers deal with debugging, visibility, and performance.

Due to its versatile capabilities, React is used by all the big brands including Tesla, Facebook, Airbnb, Skype, and more. Here you have a list of the powerful react developer tools that empower developers to boost their productivity by

  • Bit
  • React Sight
  • React Developers Tools
  • Create React App
  • Storybook
  • React Bootstrap
  • React Styleguideist
  • Proton Native
  • React-Proto
  • Why did you render

Top 10 React Developer Tools for Web & Mobile App Development

1. Bit

It is the best tool for creating and sharing the react components. Bit enables developers with an online platform and a CLI tool where they can publish react components and share them with others.

Moreover, you can search for components created and published by third parties. Using third party stores you can access the full marketplace of components. You can easily understand that these components suppose to do just by reading some code.

Get a detailed view of each component and edit the code that used to render the preview. Ensure that the components fit into your needs before downloading and installing Bit for your project.

Bit offers a command-line tool that allows developers to track changes on each component individually without considering them as separate projects. Moreover, the tools allow to create your own component library.

2. React Sight

It is a chrome extension that you can install to perform react inspection related tasks. After installing the react developer tools extension in chrome, install React Sight extension.

React Sight displays your React app with a live component hierarchy tree of the entire app. Moreover, it supports redux, react fiber, and react-router.

While running local file URLs, ensure to enable “Allow access to file URLs” for both react sight and react developer tools. Install the extension in chrome and run the react app and open the react based website.

It is a react visualization tool with a prop tree viewer and live state that complements React dev tools.

3. React Developers Tools

The most obvious react tool to build react apps. Install the latest version (4th) of React developer tools extension in Chrome. The dev tools have tabs of components that are rendered on the screen. It also has subcomponents spawning from others.

Select the components and inspect or edit their props and state. Using the profiler tab, you can track app performance too. It helps to see how changing single components affect other components and help them to create a better component structure. Almost 1 million users are already using the Facebook invented tool.

4. Create React App

Invented by Facebook, create react app is a single command-line tool that allows developers to accelerate the process of setting up the environment for react app development. The react developer tool optimizes the app for production, sets up a developer environment, and enables programmers with a front-end build pipeline.

The tool allows developers to use any programming language for back-end development and save the time of engineers.

5. Storybook

React allows creating an intuitive UI using advanced components. When you want to create a UI that is separate from your business logic, this tool provides a sandbox. The sandbox works as a playground to create components.

The reason it is called storybooks because the sandbox documents the components as stories. Each story has stats. Each state can be compared with the visual test case. A story is basically a function that delivers value and is rendered to the screens.

6. React Bootstrap

Bootstrap is the popular CSS framework that provides a set of JavaScript functions and CSS classes to build wonderful UIs. It is very simple to use so you can use it without any technical knowledge of any of these technologies.

The React bootstrap has re-written the JavaScript bits to make it compatible with react. Not developers can use the bootstrap components just as they react components.

7. React Styleguideist

Another UI tool that is very interactive and interesting and can be used to create and showcase UI components. It allows developers to write UI code and simultaneously generate the UI. You can test the code and change the code in the rendered version if required.

8. Proton Native

Proton Native allows you to develop native desktop applications using react. Earlier, developers had to use JavaScript to build desktop react apps. The tool allows you to define the GUI elements and react components. The react developer tool is compatible with all Node.js modules as the Proton has a completely cross-platform nature.

9. React-Proto

This is the best react developer tool for engineers who focus more on visual design and less into coding. It allows you to create prototype UIs using drag & drop rather than writing code.

Well, this doesn’t mean it allows you to create app UI without writing a single line of code. It provides the prototyping components that developers need. You can take an image and use react proto to mark all potential components from that image as well as set props, names, and a hierarchy of the components.

Once you have all the components, export them into auto-generated code. You can customize the code later on. If you are working with a project that is already designed, then react proto is the best tool to save a lot of time for the initial setup of the project. Additionally, the app developed using this tool is compatible with all major systems.

10. Why did you render

When you want to debug the behavior of your component, this is the best tool to try. It is very important for developers to understand when to render and re-render the components as they are not always straightforward. Especially, if you have just started with the react development. Why did you render tool tells you when avoidable renders activate along with the reasons of why.

Takeaway

All the above react tools are used to serve different purposes such as to build web applications, create visuals, or write code. Well, these tools do not serve to any single purpose. You can use them together to complement each other.

Credencys has a team of React JS developers who have proven expertise and experience in using the advanced react developer tools. Offering end-to-end React JS development services, we speed up the app development cycle and help you to launch your web and mobile applications with improved time-to-market.

Frequently Asked Questions for React Developer Tools

How do I enable react developer tools in Firefox?

Using the react developer tools, you can inspect a react tree that involves components states, props, hierarchy, and much more. To install the react developer tools in your Firefox browser, just open the devtools and switch to the “Components” and “Profiler” tabs.

How do I open developer tools in Chrome?

To activate DevTools on any web page or app in Google Chrome, you have two options to choose from.

  • Open the Chrome menu (available at the top-right of your browser window) > select Tools > Developer Tools
  • Right-click on any page element > select Inspect Element

How do I add react extensions to Chrome?

To add react extensions in the Chrome browser, you need to go to chrome://extensions page and switch to developer mode. It allows you to locally install a Chrome extension. Now, either you can click on the LOAD UNPACKED and browse to [PROJECT_HOME]\build or just drag and drop the build folder.

What is a react developer?

React developer is an ultimate JavaScript library for front-end developers. It helps engineers to build a better web and mobile application by harnessing the potential of React technology.

Many organizations have started considering react as an essential skill for developers. It is very important for react developers to stay hungry to level-up or audit the skills related to Facebook’s prominent JavaScript Library.

Why is react so popular?

The key reasons behind the popularity of the react technology are: it is compatible with DOM API and allows developers to work with a virtual browser that is more efficient and easy-to-use than a real browser. Ultimately, the knowledge of JavaScript helps a programmer to be a better react js developer.


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