StackShareStackShare
Follow on
StackShare

Discover and share technology stacks from companies around the world.

Follow on

© 2025 StackShare. All rights reserved.

Product

  • Stacks
  • Tools
  • Feed

Company

  • About
  • Contact

Legal

  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Service
  1. Stackups
  2. Application & Data
  3. Frameworks
  4. Cross Platform Desktop Development
  5. Electron vs React Navigation

Electron vs React Navigation

OverviewDecisionsComparisonAlternatives

Overview

Electron
Electron
Stacks11.6K
Followers10.0K
Votes148
React Navigation
React Navigation
Stacks1.4K
Followers348
Votes1

Electron vs React Navigation: What are the differences?

Differences between Electron and React Navigation

1. Architecture

Electron is a framework that allows for the development of desktop applications using web technologies such as HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. It combines a Chromium browser and Node.js runtime, enabling developers to build cross-platform desktop applications. In contrast, React Navigation is a library for routing and navigation in a React Native application, which is used to build mobile applications for iOS and Android. It provides a way to navigate between different screens and manage the navigation stack.

2. Platform Support

Electron supports developing desktop applications for multiple platforms, including Windows, macOS, and Linux. It provides a consistent user experience across different operating systems. On the other hand, React Navigation is specifically designed for mobile applications and supports iOS and Android platforms. It leverages platform-specific navigation patterns and gestures to provide a native-like experience on each platform.

3. Development Paradigm

Electron follows a traditional desktop application development paradigm where the user interface is built using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, similar to web development. It allows for more flexibility in UI customization and integration with web technologies. In contrast, React Navigation follows a component-based development paradigm where the UI is built using React Native components. It provides a declarative way to describe the UI and navigation flow, making it easier to reason about and maintain the codebase.

4. Performance

Electron applications tend to have a larger memory footprint and higher resource consumption compared to React Navigation. This is because Electron includes a Chromium browser and the Node.js runtime, which require more system resources. React Navigation, being specifically built for mobile applications, is optimized for performance and memory usage. It leverages native platform capabilities and optimizations to provide a smoother and more efficient navigation experience.

5. Integration with Native APIs

Electron provides access to a wide range of native APIs and system resources through Node.js modules. This allows developers to interact with the underlying operating system and integrate with native functionalities, such as file system access, system notifications, and more. React Navigation, on the other hand, primarily focuses on the navigation aspects of the application and does not provide direct access to native APIs. However, React Native, the underlying framework for React Navigation, provides a bridge to access native APIs through JavaScript code.

6. Community and Ecosystem

Electron has a large and active community with a wide range of plugins and libraries available for extending its functionality. It has been around for a longer time and has a mature ecosystem. React Navigation, being a part of the React Native ecosystem, also has a growing community with a variety of third-party libraries and plugins. However, compared to Electron, the React Native ecosystem might be relatively smaller and more focused on mobile app development.

In summary, Electron is a framework for developing cross-platform desktop applications using web technologies, while React Navigation is a library for navigating and managing screens in React Native mobile applications. They differ in terms of architecture, platform support, development paradigm, performance, integration with native APIs, and community and ecosystem.

Share your Stack

Help developers discover the tools you use. Get visibility for your team's tech choices and contribute to the community's knowledge.

View Docs
CLI (Node.js)
or
Manual

Advice on Electron, React Navigation

Semih
Semih

Software Engineering Manager

Oct 1, 2020

Needs adviceonJavaScriptJavaScriptHTML5HTML5.NET.NET

Hi,

We are planning to develop a brand new UX for an already existing desktop software. The previous version is developed on C#.NET with Winforms & WPF. Our plan is to use JavaScript/HTML5 based frontend technologies for the new software. For some components, we are highly dependent on .NET/ .NET Core because the JS-based versions are not mature enough.

What would you choose for a desktop-based Engineering Software that supports multi-OS and has rich UI capabilities considering the .NET dependencies?

Thanks in advance,

Semih

57.9k views57.9k
Comments

Detailed Comparison

Electron
Electron
React Navigation
React Navigation

With Electron, creating a desktop application for your company or idea is easy. Initially developed for GitHub's Atom editor, Electron has since been used to create applications by companies like Microsoft, Facebook, Slack, and Docker. The Electron framework lets you write cross-platform desktop applications using JavaScript, HTML and CSS. It is based on io.js and Chromium and is used in the Atom editor.

Start quickly with built-in navigators that deliver a seamless out-of-the box experience. Navigation views that deliver 60fps animations, and utilize native components to deliver a great look and feel.

Use HTML, CSS, and JavaScript with Chromium and Node.js to build your app.;Electron is open source; maintained by GitHub and an active community.;Electron apps build and run on Mac, Windows, and Linux.;Automatic updates;Crash reporting;Windows installers;Debugging & profiling;Native menus & notifications
-
Statistics
Stacks
11.6K
Stacks
1.4K
Followers
10.0K
Followers
348
Votes
148
Votes
1
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 69
    Easy to make rich cross platform desktop applications
  • 53
    Open source
  • 14
    Great looking apps such as Slack and Visual Studio Code
  • 8
    Because it's cross platform
  • 4
    Use Node.js in the Main Process
Cons
  • 19
    Uses a lot of memory
  • 8
    User experience never as good as a native app
  • 4
    No proper documentation
  • 4
    Does not native
  • 1
    Each app needs to install a new chromium + nodejs
Pros
  • 1
    Easy to use
Integrations
No integrations available
React Native
React Native

What are some alternatives to Electron, React Navigation?

Sciter

Sciter

It brings a stack of web technologies to desktop UI development. Web designers, and developers, can reuse their experience and expertise in creating modern looking desktop applications.

wxWidgets

wxWidgets

It is a C++ library that lets developers create applications for Windows, macOS, Linux and other platforms with a single code base. It has popular language bindings for Python, Perl, Ruby and many other languages, and unlike other cross-platform toolkits, it gives applications a truly native look and feel because it uses the platform's native API rather than emulating the GUI. It's also extensive, free, open-source and mature.

Replit

Replit

It is a platform for creating and sharing software. You can write your code and host it all in the same place. It is also a place to learn how to code.

Qt5

Qt5

It is a full development framework with tools designed to streamline the creation of applications and user interfaces for desktop, embedded, and mobile platforms.

JavaFX

JavaFX

It is a set of graphics and media packages that enables developers to design, create, test, debug, and deploy rich client applications that operate consistently across diverse platforms.

React Native Desktop

React Native Desktop

Build OS X desktop apps using React Native.

JUCE

JUCE

It is a C++ framework for low-latency applications, with cross-platform GUI libraries to get your apps running on Mac OS X, Windows, Linux, iOS and Android.

Proton Native

Proton Native

Create native desktop applications through a React syntax, on all platforms.

NodeGUI

NodeGUI

It is an open source library for building cross-platform native desktop applications with JavaScript and CSS like styling. It is based on Qt5 and NOT chromium, hence it is memory and cpu efficient.

pygame

pygame

It is a cross-platform set of Python modules designed for writing video games. It includes computer graphics and sound libraries designed to be used with the Python programming language.

Related Comparisons

Bootstrap
Materialize

Bootstrap vs Materialize

Laravel
Django

Django vs Laravel vs Node.js

Bootstrap
Foundation

Bootstrap vs Foundation vs Material UI

Node.js
Spring Boot

Node.js vs Spring-Boot

Liquibase
Flyway

Flyway vs Liquibase