How is this different from valtio etc.?

[KrishnaPG]

pmndrs has multiple state management libraries: valtio, zustand, koota and jotai.

All seem to be pretty much targeting the same functionality.

Q:

1. It is not clear why there exists multiple, and there does not seem to be any documentation comparing and contrast these with each other (specifically, when to use what, pros and cons etc.)
2. Or is it more like one of these is going to replace all the others?

It is really confusing to see multiple packages of same functionality under one brand. It would be great if they all either get merged into one or others get marked as deprecated and one remains.

[dai-shi]

I hope someone else can answer to those questions from their (user's) perspective.

I will try it from my perspective later anyways.

[sagarpanchal]

TL;DR. If confused, use Zustand.

https://zustand.docs.pmnd.rs/getting-started/comparison

https://npm-stat.com/charts.html?package=zustand&package=jotai&package=valtio&package=%40reduxjs%2Ftoolkit&package=recoil

Zustand

• Minimal and scalable state management with both React hooks and a vanilla API.
• Suitable for managing global or feature-specific state in React or non-React environments.

Valtio

• Proxy-based state management enabling direct state mutation with automatic reactivity.
• Ideal for applications requiring reactive state management with direct manipulation of state objects, usable outside of React.

Jotai

• Atom-based state management offering fine-grained reactivity within React.
• Effective for managing both local and global state in React applications with minimal boilerplate.

Koota

• Entity-Component-System (ECS) inspired state management tailored for real-time applications.
• Designed for high-performance scenarios like gaming and extended reality applications within React.

---

@dai-shi Correct me if I'm wrong. 😓

[dai-shi]

1. It is not clear why there exists multiple, and there does not seem to be any documentation comparing and contrast these with each other (specifically, when to use what, pros and cons etc.)

Yeah, we don't have a comprehensive docs to compare them. We could describe some characteristics to compare, but "when to use what" is something we don't answer (maybe except for koota) as we don't have definitive answer.

I don't disagree that it would be nice to have such a comparison, and this is one attempt: https://react-community-tools-practices-cheatsheet.netlify.app/state-management/poimandres/

2. Or is it more like one of these is going to replace all the others?

I originally thought about extending Zustand to add more features, but that didn't go well. It was partly due to technical reasons, but also non-technical ones. For example, one of the unavoidable features of Zustand is its small size.

We generally prefer things to be small and dedicated. So, instead of providing one big library and letting users choose a few functionalities for their use cases, we provide multiple dedicated libraries and let users pick the ones they need.