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SO questions by month doesn't mean it's more popular. Whenever I search for something in React Native it's already answered in the past or has a regular React

SO questions by month doesn't mean it's more popular. Whenever I search for something in React Native it's already answered in the past or has a regular React equivalent answered so I don't need to ask a new question. Since Flutter is newer and uses a less popular language there's many more questions about Flutter. This is totally expected. Call me tinfoil but I believe SO is really financially supported directly or indirectly to support Flutter over React Native.

gtirloni 5y ago
> Call me tinfoil but I believe SO is really financially supported directly or indirectly to support Flutter over React Native Could you elaborate on this one?
- can16358p 5y ago
  People at SO are definitely smart and that blog post seems a bit skewed. Almost all the good sides they praise Flutter can be equally or better applied to RN too. I try to "reverse engineer" it and think "what would have caused these very smart people to write such a lame blog post that doesn't reflect reality" and that leads me to this conclusion. Again, I just said I believe in this. Maybe I am wrong.
  - daanlo 5y ago
    In my experience, the majority of engineers evangelize the tech stack they use, even when this makes no sense. Hence => Flame Wars ;)
    - can16358p 5y ago
      Many do, including me. But I really try to be realistic and frankly can't see Flutter being truly more popular. But just because I favor React Native over Flutter doesn't necessarily mean that I'm biased and there's no truth in what I'm saying.
      - winter_squirrel 5y ago
- auxfil 5y ago
  It's a shill piece.
jasode 5y ago
>Since Flutter is newer and uses a less popular language there's many more questions about Flutter. This is totally expected. It's more complicated than your proposed cause & effect. A counterexample is that Rust is much newer than C++ and yet C++ still has higher volume of questions using Stackoverflow's trending tool: https://insights.stackoverflow.com/trends?tags=rust%2Cc%2B%2B https://insights.stackoverflow.com/trends?tags=rust%2Cc%2B%2... This matches real world observation that C++ is still more popular and widely used than Rust. I don't have the raw data but I'm guessing that even if Stackoverflow compared Flutter-vs-ReactNative # search queries instead of # of questions, Flutter would still have a higher count. Another article highlighting Google Trends[1] shows that Flutter surpassed React Native around 2020: https://www.nomtek.com/blog/flutter-vs-react-native https://www.nomtek.com/blog/flutter-vs-react-native [1] https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=2018-01-02%202022-01-02&q=%2Fg%2F11h03gfxy9,%2Fg%2F11f03_rzbg https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=2018-01-02%202...
- anthropodie 5y ago
  Another metric could be activity on their respective subreddits. Here is subscriber count: Flutter: 87K, Initial Release: Mar-2015 React native 88K, Initial Release: May-2017 I think growth rate of Flutter is higher than React.
  - cute_boi 5y ago
    I think you got date incorrect?
    - anthropodie 5y ago
      Yeah it should be reverse and now I can't edit it.
  - kumarvvr 5y ago
    Sorry, the two year lead that Flutter has, and still being close to React Native in terms of subscribers implies React Native was picked up quicker or is more popular. However, I do agree that RN has the momentum and familiarity of React as tailwinds.
usrusr 5y ago
It's not just that: of all the questions that might come up during development of an app built on react native, a big chunk won't be related to react native at all. Those questions won't be counted for react native in that metric. Flutter on the other hand is on the very far end of the batteries included spectrum, every question that might come up is tightly related to the fact that it's in the context of a flutter app.
johndfsgdgdfg 5y ago
> Call me tinfoil but I believe SO is really financially supported directly or indirectly to support Flutter over React Native. Thank you for bringing up a very good point. There's definitely manipulation going on. I've never used Flutter, but this blogpost doesn't reflect the impresion I get on HN regarding Flutter or even Google in general.

gtirloni 5y ago

> Call me tinfoil but I believe SO is really financially supported directly or indirectly to support Flutter over React Native Could you elaborate on this one?

can16358p 5y ago
People at SO are definitely smart and that blog post seems a bit skewed. Almost all the good sides they praise Flutter can be equally or better applied to RN too. I try to "reverse engineer" it and think "what would have caused these very smart people to write such a lame blog post that doesn't reflect reality" and that leads me to this conclusion. Again, I just said I believe in this. Maybe I am wrong.
- daanlo 5y ago
  In my experience, the majority of engineers evangelize the tech stack they use, even when this makes no sense. Hence => Flame Wars ;)
  - can16358p 5y ago
    Many do, including me. But I really try to be realistic and frankly can't see Flutter being truly more popular. But just because I favor React Native over Flutter doesn't necessarily mean that I'm biased and there's no truth in what I'm saying.
    - winter_squirrel 5y ago
auxfil 5y ago
It's a shill piece.

jasode 5y ago

>Since Flutter is newer and uses a less popular language there's many more questions about Flutter. This is totally expected. It's more complicated than your proposed cause & effect. A counterexample is that Rust is much newer than C++ and yet C++ still has higher volume of questions using Stackoverflow's trending tool: https://insights.stackoverflow.com/trends?tags=rust%2Cc%2B%2B https://insights.stackoverflow.com/trends?tags=rust%2Cc%2B%2... This matches real world observation that C++ is still more popular and widely used than Rust. I don't have the raw data but I'm guessing that even if Stackoverflow compared Flutter-vs-ReactNative # search queries instead of # of questions, Flutter would still have a higher count. Another article highlighting Google Trends[1] shows that Flutter surpassed React Native around 2020: https://www.nomtek.com/blog/flutter-vs-react-native https://www.nomtek.com/blog/flutter-vs-react-native [1] https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=2018-01-02%202022-01-02&q=%2Fg%2F11h03gfxy9,%2Fg%2F11f03_rzbg https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=2018-01-02%202...

anthropodie 5y ago
Another metric could be activity on their respective subreddits. Here is subscriber count: Flutter: 87K, Initial Release: Mar-2015 React native 88K, Initial Release: May-2017 I think growth rate of Flutter is higher than React.
- cute_boi 5y ago
  I think you got date incorrect?
  - anthropodie 5y ago
    Yeah it should be reverse and now I can't edit it.
- kumarvvr 5y ago
  Sorry, the two year lead that Flutter has, and still being close to React Native in terms of subscribers implies React Native was picked up quicker or is more popular. However, I do agree that RN has the momentum and familiarity of React as tailwinds.

usrusr 5y ago

It's not just that: of all the questions that might come up during development of an app built on react native, a big chunk won't be related to react native at all. Those questions won't be counted for react native in that metric. Flutter on the other hand is on the very far end of the batteries included spectrum, every question that might come up is tightly related to the fact that it's in the context of a flutter app.

johndfsgdgdfg 5y ago

> Call me tinfoil but I believe SO is really financially supported directly or indirectly to support Flutter over React Native. Thank you for bringing up a very good point. There's definitely manipulation going on. I've never used Flutter, but this blogpost doesn't reflect the impresion I get on HN regarding Flutter or even Google in general.