Why I Migrated From Next.js to Create React App

I didn’t migrate from CRA to Next — here’s why

Photo by Clément H on Unsplash

Let me start by saying I’m a big fan of Next.js. It’s an amazing framework for building React applications, especially when you need Server-Side Rendering (SSR). One day, I’ll write an article covering all the great things about this framework, but luckily a lot of people are already doing that.

Instead, I’m now going to explain why I migrated one of my many side projects from Next.js to Create React App.

Note: If you don’t care about the background story, scroll down and go straight to the conclusion.

Start Free

When you have many side projects (that don’t make you any money), it’s nice if you can host them for free. I have a Ruby on Rails project hosted on a custom domain on Heroku that’s already costing me more than 30 dollars a month, which is fine — if you have just one project or if that project is making you some money…

The cool thing about building a React application with Firebase and Firestore is that you can build a full-stack application and go live without any costs (except for the custom domain name). I did that with side projects like FlowReads and MakerMove. I also made React Milkshake, a boilerplate for creating apps with this stack. For…