It's "just" a convention, but a strongly encouraged one. The React docs say: Its name should always start with `use` so that you can tell at a glance that the

It's "just" a convention, but a strongly encouraged one. The React docs say: Its name should always start with `use` so that you can tell at a glance that the rules of Hooks apply to it. And it is required and enforced if you use the ESLint react-hooks plugin (which I'm guessing most large projects do).