Gabriel Peal, Android developer at Airbnb:
In 2016, we took a big bet on React Native. Two years later, we’re ready to share our experience with the world and show what’s next.
The result is a 5-part series of posts:
- Part 1: React Native at Airbnb
- Part 2: The Technology
- Part 3: Building a Cross-Platform Mobile Team
- Part 4: Sunsetting React Native
- Part 5: What’s Next for Mobile at Airbnb
Yes that’s right, in part 4 he explains why they’re moving away from React Native as it no longer was a right fit for them:
Because we weren’t able to achieve our specific goals, we have decided that React Native isn’t right for us anymore.
This doesn’t mean they consider React Native to have failed, or that they dislike it:
63% of engineers would have chosen React Native again given the chance and 74% would consider React Native for a new project.
Be sure to read all parts and take your time for it. Lots of information. Lots of nuances. Your mileage may will vary.
👨💻 Having worked on a *huge* React Native project for De Persgroep (video below) for the past 10 months, most of the things – both bad and good – Gabriel writes sound really familiar.
Unlike Airbnb though, we were fortunate enough to be creating a new app from scratch (instead of plugging RN onto an existing app), and got in to RN way past its pioneering phase (we started at RN 0.47) by which most wrinkles had already been ironed out.