Next.js Conference 2020: Recapped
If you were not able to make it to Next.js Conference 2020 you are in luck, because I am going to give you the TL;DR and run down of big announcements. It was a huge day for the next community, Vercel, ecommerce, and BigCommerce. Our teams had a great time preparing and participating. I am excited to share this experience with you.
TL;DR
Next.js is an innovator in React Frameworks. It is the production-ready framework for headless development on the JAMStack.
Next.js 10 launched at Next.js Conference with features like:
- Image Optimization
- Internationalization (I18N)
- Analytics
Next.js also announced the launch of Next Commerce featuring BigCommerce as the commerce integration. You can start developing your headless commerce solution in minutes with a BigCommerce sandbox store and deployment to Vercel.
Ecommerce Sessions
Keynote
In the Keynote session, BigCommerce was highlighted by Belen Curcio, a Solution Architect at Vercel. She stated that due to COVID ten years of ecommerce growth was pushed into just three months. Belen continued by noting that traditional monoliths with their inflexible structure create a single point of failure thus the need for headless solutions. She announced that,
“In collaboration with BigCommerce, Next Commerce is the all-in-one starter kit for high-performance ecommerce sites”.
Next Commerce includes all of the features of Next.js version 10 that were highlighted in the keynote as well. Next.js 10 features are pivotal for ecommerce evolution. Developers need image optimization, internationalization, and analytics to take ecommerce sites to the next level.
Belen rounds out the keynote with the impressive features of Next Commerce like:
- The application is SEO ready, with configuration that makes the application indexable, searchable, and rankable.
- The application is responsive to mobile devices.
- The data hooks are BigCommerce enabled for Catalog, Wishlist, Cart, and other utilities.
The conclusion of Belen’s keynote is this, “Ecommerce is one of the most important uses of the web. We’re proud of this example and the advancements it shows for ecommerce, and we know that the Next.js Community will contribute, and together we can raise the standard for ecommerce sites.”
I couldn’t agree more with this statement. BigCommerce too is very proud of Next Commerce and we look forward to the developers in the community helping us to make improvements and advances.
Future of Ecommerce Panel
Our very own VP of Platform Strategy, Nate Stewart spoke as part of this four-piece panel that also included Shopify CTO Jean-Michel Lemieux, Director of Engineering at Hy-Vee Michael Novotny, and Lead Software Engineer at Target Bryce Kalow. This panel addressed the needs of ecommerce and the development experience of teams in this space. Guillermo Rauch, CEO of Vercel did an excellent job of moderating the discussion.
My favorite part of the discussion was the conversation around development choices and experiences. Nate Stewart brought up a great point that not only are user experiences becoming more complex, making the choices of development teams more complex as well. It is harder to determine the best approaches and solutions. This is why ecommerce solutions should be about making the web more inclusive and being an inclusive option so that it is easier to leverage a platform.
As part of our Open SaaS strategy here at BigCommerce, we aim to be an inclusive solution to headless commerce.
JAMStack for Ecommerce at Scale
This was another panel discussion with developers from Shoe Carnival and Turnkey Vacation Rentals on the lessons they have learned from building headless JAMStack applications for ecommerce. They provided insights on how to work with large catalogs, managing frequent updates, and working with legacy ecommerce platforms. There was a lot to be learned here from their experiences.
The Next Big Thing in Ecommerce
I also spoke at the conference on “The Next Big Thing in Ecommerce”, the Next Commerce application. I spoke to the developer audience on headless ecommerce and the importance of headless development to BigCommerce. Our collaboration with Next and Vercel taught me a lot about where we need to focus platform improvements for headless development. I highlight what we accomplished with the BigCommerce platform today. The Next Commerce application utilizes BigCommerce for products, catalog, variants, search, emails, and more.
I also announced our latest developments related to our Channel’s Toolkit and Internationalization efforts with currency assignments.
This is the go-to starter kit for headless ecommerce development with Next and BigCommerce. If you haven’t tried it yet, I suggest walking through the integration with Vercel and creating your developer sandbox or integrating your existing store. You will be amazed at how easy it is to get started.
My Developer Experience
As a developer, I was super stoked to see Next.js leveraged in different ways. I was blown away to learn about the launch of Next.js 10 that day. I knew it was coming due to our collaboration with Next and Vercel but I learned about all the features at the same time as you all.
I was ping-ponging between the conference Discord and Twitter following the hashtag #nextjsconf. I was impressed with the same features as many of you, my background in automation engineering and DevOps made me especially interested in the Next.js Analytics tooling. I noticed that many of you said that was “game-changing” in the social outlets. I love how much detail is embedded, the team at Next.js knocked it out of the park on this product.
It was also amazing to see the international presence. I was truly in awe and it made me realize the impact that software like BigCommerce has on the world.
Join the Conversation
You can join the Next.js Conference conversation by joining the Discord Channel. You can also join the BigCommerce Developer Slack Community by filling out a quick form. Once invited we will add you to the #nextjs channel and feel free to add yourself to any public channels.
We look forward to having you and contributing to the future of our integration with Next.js.
