React

noun · JavaScript UI library · element 20 of 117

A JavaScript library for building interfaces out of components. It also powers WordPress's block editor.

My levelProficientComfortable in production. I ship with it without supervision.

Family: Engineering

What is React?

React builds user interfaces from components: small, reusable pieces that render from data and update when the data changes. Facebook open-sourced it in 2013, and it is now one of the most used front-end libraries.

WordPress adopted it for Gutenberg, so every block's editing interface is a React component. That makes React a WordPress skill as much as a JavaScript one.

How I use React

I use React for admin screens and custom blocks: interfaces with real state, talking to WordPress through the REST API. Custom blocks are React on the editing side.

I learned React and Redux at Seneca, and I use it where an interface has real state. For everything else, plain JavaScript is lighter.

What React connects to

JavaScriptThe programming language of the browser. It makes pages interactive, and through Node.js it runs on servers too.
GutenbergWordPress's block editor. Pages are built from blocks, and with full site editing, so are themes.
WP REST APIWordPress's built-in JSON API: read and write content over HTTP, and register your own endpoints for apps, blocks and integrations.
WordPressThe open-source content management system behind roughly two in five websites. Written in PHP and extended with themes and plugins.

Type	JavaScript UI library
Released	2013
Made by	Meta (Facebook)