Survey 2024: Which JS Frameworks Are Chosen for Production

Survey 2024: Which JavaScript (Node.js) Frameworks Are Used in Production

The Node.js ecosystem continues to amaze with its development dynamics. In mid-2024, the PythonLib team conducted a survey among 1200+ developers working with server-side JavaScript to find out which frameworks and libraries are actually running on production servers. The results proved to be illustrative and useful for choosing the stack for your next project.

The leaders of the race have hardly changed, but noticeable shifts have occurred within the top three. Let's look at the top 5 tools that developers trust in production.

Top 5 Frameworks for Production

• Express.js (82%) — the undisputed king. Minimalism, a huge community, thousands of ready-made middleware. It remains the standard for REST APIs and microservices, especially in combination with TypeScript.
• Next.js (61%) — the framework from Vercel made a leap of 15% compared to last year. React developers are increasingly choosing it not only for frontend but also for full-stack development with server components and API routes.
• NestJS (45%) — a favorite in the corporate sector. Modular architecture inspired by Angular, decorators, and a powerful DI system make it the choice for complex enterprise applications where code structure is important.
• Fastify (27%) — the fastest-growing framework. It is praised for its speed (up to 2x faster than Express), built-in JSON schema validation, and low memory consumption. It is actively used in high-load projects.
• Koa.js (14%) — a lightweight alternative to Express from the same team. It is used in production less often but occupies a solid niche in projects where asynchronous middleware processing is important.

Unexpected Trends

The survey revealed several interesting trends. First, SvelteKit (6%) and Remix (4%) still lag behind Next.js, but their share doubled over the year — apparently, developers are starting to experiment with new meta-frameworks. Second, AdonisJS (3%) retains a loyal audience thanks to its full-featured ORM (Lucid) and built-in authorization support.

Respondents also noted that in 50% of cases, the production stack is a combination of several frameworks: for example, Express for the API and Next.js for SSR rendering of the client side.

Conclusions for the Developer

If you are just entering the world of Node.js, start with Express — it's the foundation everyone should know. For full-stack React projects, confidently look towards Next.js. And if you are building a large server with strict architectural requirements, master NestJS. Keep Fastify in mind as an "accelerator" for high-load endpoints.

The full survey data (with distribution by Node.js versions, databases, and cloud providers) will be published in the next article. Stay tuned for updates on PythonLib!

The survey was conducted from June 1 to June 20, 2024. The sample included developers from Russia, the CIS, and Eastern European countries.