React Native in 2026
React Native is an excellent development platform again. Here is what changed since AirBNB moved off of it in 2018, how its New Architecture works, and where the Expo framework fits in.
Ben Houston •
Posts tagged: react
React Internals
Understand what React is doing when your components render, pause, skip work, commit to different hosts, hydrate server HTML, split work with Server Components, and hand animation off between frames.
Ben Houston •
React Server Components
Part 7 of the React Internals series. React Server Components split a tree into server-only and client-interactive pieces, serialize the server result as an RSC payload, and still rely on SSR and hydration for the Client Components that reach the browser.
Ben Houston •
Server-Side Rendering and Hydration
Part 6 of the React Internals series. Server-side rendering creates an initial HTML snapshot on the server; hydration lets react-dom attach event handlers and fibers to that existing DOM instead of replacing it.
Ben Houston •
React Spring: Motion Between Renders
Part 8 of the React Internals series. Animating through setState re-runs React's render-commit loop every frame; react-spring instead commits a target once and writes intermediate frames straight to the DOM (and, via a separate adapter, to React Three Fiber's scene graph).
Ben Houston •
An Introduction to Tailwind CSS
A practical introduction to Tailwind CSS for people who know basic CSS and want to understand utility classes, React className patterns, responsive variants, and why zero-runtime CSS fits modern React better than styled-components.
Ben Houston •
One Reconciler, Many Renderers
Part 5 of the React Internals series. React's reconciler produces host operations, and renderers such as react-dom, React Native, and React Three Fiber implement those operations for different platforms.
Ben Houston •
React Skips: How Rendering Optimization Works
Part 4 of the React Internals series. React can skip component calls, reuse finished subtrees, and avoid host mutations when props, state, context, and output prove the work is unchanged.
Ben Houston •
React Scheduling
Part 3 of the React Internals series. React schedules fiber work with lanes, interrupts lower-priority renders, keeps committed UI intact, and uses Suspense boundaries when a subtree cannot finish yet.
Ben Houston •
React Fiber Tree: The Virtual DOM
Part 2 of the React Internals series. React stores UI work in fibers, schedules updates through queues and lanes, reconciles current and work-in-progress trees, and preserves state through keys and hook order.
Ben Houston •
React Prerequisites
Part 1 of the React Internals series. A practical primer on components, elements, hosts, React's trigger, render, commit, and paint cycle, effects, the core hooks, and the immutability rules that let React skip work.
Ben Houston •
Clean GA4 for TanStack Router
A tiny, type-safe Google Analytics integration for TanStack Router and TanStack Start with automatic page views, typed GA4 helpers, and clean SSR-friendly setup.
Ben Houston •
