React Best Practices: A Guide to Building Best in Class React Apps

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React Best Practices: A Guide to Building Best in Class React Apps

ReactJS, a JavaScript-based front-end framework developed by Facebook and individual developers, is a widely used technology. It is easy to learn, and also, an essential part is writing good React code. That’s where the struggle is. With the increasing demand for React mobile app development, developers wish to deliver the finest solution in the least time. This won’t be a reality without implementing React Js best practices. By following the below-mentioned React best practices, you can develop a high-quality application.

Organize your files

It’s vital to maintain a well-organized file structure. You can utilize create-react-app to create a new project or customize an existing one. The file structure of your react application will expand rapidly.

You can start by learning how to organize your files. You can also follow a hierarchy that allows you to group your components into subfolders. This way, you can easily extract and modify the code of individual components.

You’ll have several components in one folder. For example, an asset folder will contain the top-level CSS file, images, font files, and helpers. Therefore, it’s important to keep component files in their folders.

Components Naming

React components’ names should start with uppercase letters. This will help you distinguish them from the default HTML tags. This is a crucial React best practice to avoid conflicts between code and comments. This best practice also increases reusability. When naming React components, avoid using spaces and name them after their functions. This makes it easier to maintain and test them in the future.

Keep Components Small

One of the most important React JS best practices is to keep components small. Keeping components small is essential for maintaining consistency and sustainability. As a general rule, keep your components small, preferably smaller than ten lines.

Name components after their functions

One of React best practices is to name them after their functions. Using the same names for each component is also important to keep them well separated and easier to modify. This will ensure that you don’t have to write multiple versions of the same component. For example, a button component can handle icons and a modal window. A button component should be modular and handle many different use cases with a single piece of code. This practice will declutter your app and lower your efforts to code and test it.

Keep all the related files in the same folder.

By keeping component files in the same folder, you’ll avoid the risk of losing files. In large projects, your file structure will grow quickly. Each component will contain multiple files in the assets folder—for instance, your top-level CSS, images, font files, and helpers. At the end of the project, when you want to change something in the component, you will end up going nowhere if files are in different folders. Therefore, it’s best to keep all the essential files of a large module in the same folder so that they’re easy to find and modify.

Don’t Repeat Your Code.

Your application should be organized in a way that minimizes code duplication. When you’re coding for a website, you should avoid duplicating code. You should keep your code as short as possible. Don’t repeat yourself. This principle is essential for ReactJS as well. A poorly structured code is difficult to maintain, and it can be hard to read for other developers.

Keep logic separate from UI components.

Keeping business logic separate from UI is one of React’s top best practices. This separation ensures that components are easy to reuse and test and prevents duplication. To separate your UI from your underlying business logic, you should create two components: the form and the corresponding UI. The Form component should have all the corresponding files, and other folders will contain UI files.

Develop smaller and reusable components

A reusable component is a small code responsible for just one function. A smaller component is easier to maintain, update, and debug. Therefore, it is also easier to reuse. When using React, it’s essential to avoid creating complex components. This is because they are difficult to maintain and change. Moreover, smaller components are more reusable and can save you time.

Write Test for Code

In React, one of the best practices is to write tests for all code. It is important to write tests for all of your code before it deploys to production. But you can’t always check every line of code, but writing tests for all code is essential. By writing tests, you’ll prevent yourself from introducing bugs and dead code in your app. You’ll have the confidence to refactor without worrying that the code will break. And by writing tests for your code, you can make sure you don’t have any problems in the future. This is important because it can reduce the number of errors your app will have when deployed.

Test Your Code

When designing an app with React, remember that it’s not enough to make it look pretty. It’s essential to keep your app functional and user-friendly, but it must meet these two requirements. T’s imperative to test everything you can, from your app’s design to your code. You must ensure that your app is optimized for mobile-first and then focused on providing it a better user experience.

Always use linter

In React, we use JSX to write the code. This syntax looks like HTML, and it is used to describe the UI. Therefore, when we write JSX, we need to ensure that it is written invalid syntax. A linter will help us do this by highlighting all the errors in our code to fix them before handing off our work to other developers.

The benefits of using a linter while developing applications in React are multifold. First, it helps us save time by highlighting any errors in our code to fix them before handing off our work to other developers.

Adhere to the Reusability principle

The single responsibility principle is widely accepted but hard to follow. It aims to reduce code complexity, simplify testing, and minimize the number of components in the application. However, in some examples of reactive apps, one component performs two broad responsibilities: appearance and functionality. These two responsibilities are not necessary to the application. Instead, the developer can create a purely functional component that can be reused in the future.

Wrap Up

Creating and using React components is not difficult, but it is important to follow the right guidelines. React components should be able to be reused in other React projects. This will make reusing them easy. Implement these React best practices to fine-tune your app.

If you are looking for expert help in developing React mobile apps, then you are at the right place. We, the team of EnProwess Technologies, are committed to helping you with your business requirements. You can hire dedicated Reactjs developers to build your IT solution. Compared to our peers, prices are affordable against the same code quality and after-sales support. For information, visit our website.

React Best Practices: A Guide to Building Best in Class React Apps