What is React?

React, in one line, is “a JavaScript library for building user interfaces”.

Characteristics of React

1. Declarative

It means that you just have to tell what you want to do and not how you want to do it.
In other words, you only declare what the end goal is, but not the intermediary steps to reach that goal. The intermediary steps are taken care of by the system (React in this case) itself.
This property makes it fairly easy to create interactive UIs.

2. Component Based

React uses components to create UIs. Components are similar to HTML elements with added functionalities to make it re-usable.
In React, you will build encapsulated components that manage their own state, then compose them to make complex UIs.

3. Learn Once, Write Anywhere

React doesn’t make assumptions about the rest of your technology stack, so you can develop new features in React without rewriting existing code.

From the next article itself, we’ll start learning about the basic concepts of React.