Node JS vs Express.js vs Koa.js

Node JS

Node JS is a free, cross platform, open-source JavaScript runtime environment that runs on chrome v8 engine. Node JS was introduced in 2009. It is not a JavaScript framework or library. It can execute JavaScript code outside a browser. Node JS is written using JavaScript, C, C++. It runs on various platforms like windows, Mac OS, Linux etc. Node JS is single threaded and uses even-driven, non-blocking I/O model. Almost any IDEs support node JS. Developers must install Node JS on their system if they hope to work with it. It is a very popular technology among programmers now a days because of its’ features.

Most of popular companies use node JS for their websites.

· eBay

· Netflix

· NASA

· trello

· paypal

· LinkedIn

· Uber

· twitter

· Medium

It is useful for generate faster, scalable web applications, real-time applications. Node JS has its own benefits which attracts developers.

· It is more efficient and increases developer productivity

· Has a great performance and speed

· It has lot of free tools

· It can share code and reuse the code

· It can easily share knowledge within a team

Node JS is capable of handling many things like

=> can add, delete, modify data in your database

=> can create, open, read, write, delete, and close files on the server

=> can generate dynamic page content

=> can collect form data

You can check your Node version by typing node -v command on terminal

> node -v

v12.18.4

You can check your npm version by typing npm -v command on terminal

> npm -v

6.14.6

Express.js

Express.js is a free, open-source backend web application framework for node JS. That means most of the code is already written. So, it is very easy for programmers to coding faster and working with a framework like Express.js saves time. Express.js which is written in JavaScript is exactly designed for APIs and web applications and it only supports to JavaScript language. You are able to build single page, multi pages, or hybrid apps using Express.js. Developers have to install Express.js along with Node JS and NPM on their system if they willing to use it. Since Express.js is the most famous Node JS framework it has more than 9 million downloads per week. Express.js is part of MEAN, MERN and NERD stack.

MEAN stack

M — MongoDB

E — Express.js

A — Angular JS

N — Node JS

MERN stack

M — MongoDB

E — Express.js

R — React JS

N — Node JS

NERD stack

N — Node JS

E — Express.js

R — React JS

D — DocumentDB

Popular companies which are using Express are

Ø IBM

. uber

. FoxSport

. twitter

. Accenture

. bepro

It has some extra features

=> Debugging

=> Templating

=> Routing

=> Middleware

You can install Express.js by typing command on terminal

npm install express

Koa.js

Koa.js is an open-source web application framework for Node JS which is developed by Express.js team. Koa aims to be smaller, expressive, more robust than Express.js. It is written in JavaScript and supports only JavaScript language. It has more than 300000 downloads per week. It is very easier to write middleware with Koa. It can take 2 different function types

Ø async function

Ø common function

as middleware. Developers have to install Koa.js along with Node v7.6.0 or higher to use it.

Popular companies using Koa.js for their websites are

· Paralect

· GAPO

· bulb

· pubu

· pier

· brainhub

· shimo

You can install Koa by typing command on terminal

$ npm install koa