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Why Redux Is More Relevant Than Ever Today
An opinion regarding the permeating contemplation of Redux vs. Context API
Over the last year or so I have encountered several opinions suggesting that the React ecosystem is recommending the deprecation of Redux in their projects in favor of moving towards “modern React” using the Context API. A few episodes on React Podcast have alluded as such (with such notions as “have you migrated your Redux over to Context yet?”) and there have been multiple articles published that exemplify this viewpoint. I’ve heard from bootcamp graduates whose instructors have rushed through the Redux content of their curriculum because it was “too complicated” and “people don’t use it anymore anyway.” Additionally, I’ve heard this sentiment spread to a brand new self-taught developer as he was starting on a new project at our company:
“I thought people were kinda moving away from Redux in favor of Context…“ — Anonymous self-taught developer
I myself even suggested that perhaps Thunks, a tool for making asynchronous action calls, were obsolete — which I no longer think thanks to Redux Toolkit and some inconveniences that I have since experienced when using only custom hooks in projects. Honestly, I think we all kind of just got excited about new React features and thought “This is the future!” They are cool, and they empower a lot of useful things. But getting rid of Redux is not one of them.
Perhaps the sentiment has arisen from a handful of controversial headlines without a lot of really in-depth analysis, but Redux is not dead. In fact, I think it is more relevant than ever. Of course, I don’t mean to come off officiously on the subject. It might not work for every project. In fact, Dan Abramov, the creator of Redux, has suggested that perhaps you don’t need Redux in your project in an article back in 2016. But for my organization, I have found several reasons why we will continue to use Redux for the foreseeable…
