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microsoft
react-native-windows
C++2016–2026
microsoft / react-native-windows

react-native-windows

A framework for building native Windows apps with React.

Web DevelopmentMobile & Desktop
Explore on GitHubRead Hacker News discussions
64Distinct people
76Mentions
0Explicit recommenders
17.4KGitHub stars
REPOSITORY AT A GLANCE

What to know before exploring

What it is

A framework for building native Windows apps with React.

GitHub

Where it is used

No documented product use was verified in the last source check.

What people are saying

No recommendation phrase was found in the indexed comments.

No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.

Also in these discussions

Mentioned in the same Hacker News threads. That is not proof they are substitutes.

This week on Hacker News

Nov 7–Nov 14 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/14/2026, 6:01:08 PM UTC.

No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.

Mentions over time

HN mentions by year76 dated mentions

Observed mentions: 2016-04-13 17:36:49 UTC to 2026-03-25 18:35:34 UTC.

05101520252016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 11 mentions; 2 submissions, 9 comments20162017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 23 mentions; 1 submissions, 22 comments2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 14 mentions; 1 submissions, 13 comments2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 14 mentions; 3 submissions, 11 comments2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 7 mentions; 1 submissions, 6 comments2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 3 mentions; 0 submissions, 3 comments20212022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 1 submissions, 1 comments2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2027-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments. Incomplete calendar period.2026*

* An incomplete calendar period is marked with an outlined bar. Its count is not directly comparable with a full period.

Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.

View mention counts and date ranges
UTC ranges include their start and exclude their end. Select a period to filter the source evidence.
PeriodStart (UTC)End (exclusive, UTC)MentionsSubmissionsComments
20162016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC1129
20172017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC23122
20182018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC14113
20192019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC14311
20202020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC716
20212021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC303
20222022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC211
20232023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20242024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20252025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
2026 (partial)2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2027-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202

What Hacker News says

23 sources
mlsarecmg·Nov 20, 2017
XAML is a template, it hooks into a controller via bindings. You could compare it to Angular maybe. In React a view is a function of state: const Header = ({ color, children }) => <h1 style={{ color }}>{children}</h1> // Gets transpiled into: const Header = ({ color, children }) => createElement('h1', { style: { color } }, children) <Header color="red">hello</Header> A large part of my career was about XAML/WPF/SL. I know it took me a year or more to really understand it deeply, being able to extend and do everything i wanted. I came to the same state 60 minutes into React. The pattern behind it does make many things easier. And that is an understatement. I believe that's also the main reason Microsoft itself is betting on React for cross platform and native apps as well as extension eco systems: https://github.
Read the rest
com/Microsoft/react-native-windows https://github.com/Microsoft/reactxp https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/fabric
In How Facebook's Instagram Acquisition Led to the Open Sourcing of React.js
mlsarecmg·Oct 1, 2017
> What often goes unnoticed is that declarative languages are not very future-proof [...] Surely that will not happen to React, you say, because it gets so many things right? Surely that will not happen to React, you say, because it gets so many things right? It is often not appreciated how simple React really is. Its simplicity is actually well suited to survive a long, long time. Forget classes, lifecycles, schedulers and all this stuff for a moment. If you boil it down what you're left with is but a single signature: `createElement(name, props, chilren)`. That's what JSX transpiles into. With that you can map pretty much every visual-oriented api on earth and as we can plainly see it goes further than that and starts rendering flat out everything that can be rendered in the same friendly manner we're used to: shell consoles: https://gi
Read the rest
thub.com/Yomguithereal/react-blessed word: https://github.com/nitin42/redocx pdf: https://github.com/diegomura/react-pdf samplers: https://twitter.com/GabeRicard/status/911989894267973633 mobile: https://facebook.github.io/react-native/ 3d: https://github.com/Izzimach/react-three windows: https://github.com/Microsoft/react-native-windows macos: https://github.com/ptmt/react-native-macos sketchapp: http://airbnb.io/react-sketchapp/ keynote: https://twitter.com/nishb1/status/913744410537537536 VR: https://facebook.github.io/react-vr/ hardware: https://github.com/iamdustan/react-hardware What's even crazier is that everyday eco-system packages can be applied to the wildest targets. For instance animations via react-motion on shell consoles: https://github.com/gaearon/react-blessed-hot-motion or react-router on VR: https://youtu.be/Mf0Fy8iHp8k?t=12m25s It's always the simple, almost trivial ideas that seem to survive and spread. React was released 4 years ago and has kept to a stable api. 16 was a rewrite, and it's a drop in replacement.
In WalmartLabs opensources its tool for bringing React Native to mobile apps
jsingleton·Aug 14, 2017
Xamarin makes this separation work pretty well. Not Xamarin.Forms but a core business logic project with custom UI projects for each platform. I'm hoping this will turn into a good solution. Xamarin already supports Mac (in addition to iOS and Android) and when it aligns more with UWP (XAML Standard etc.) that could cover a large slice of the platforms you'd want to target. React native could be another option. I hear Android support has gotten better and you can supposedly also target UWP: https://github.com/Microsoft/react-native-windows I wrote this a while ago but it's still fairly relevant: https://unop.uk/cross-platform-native-mobile-app-development... You could also look at https://github.com/AvaloniaUI/Avalonia or https://github.com/picoe/Eto.
In Announcing .NET Core 2.0
leipert·Jul 11, 2017
Yes, there are native UIs on desktop. I tailored my answer for react-native, as you mentioned that. 1. macOS -> Aqua [1], apparently there exists an community package for react-native [2] 2. react-native-windows [3] by Microsoft which apparently has support for Windows 10 and xbox 3. There are other UI kits for linux and cross-platform, e.g. qt and gtk. I did not find much about react native there, except for ubuntu [4] PS: I got those hits by googling "react native for desktop" :P [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aqua_(user_interface) [2] https://github.com/ptmt/react-native-macos [3] https://github.com/Microsoft/react-native-windows [4] https://github.com/CanonicalLtd/react-native/blob/ubuntu/REA...
In Ask HN: Why does mobile appear to have a better dev UX compared to desktop UIs?
namuol·Apr 12, 2017
> [...] you treat a non-flattering language as me being frustrated [...] You're right; I was being presumptuous about your emotional state. I apologize. -_- Let me try to clarify: Companies like Slack and Nylas and Spotify understand the performance implications of using Electron and it _is_ a real problem, but the _benefits_ of using something like Electron, at least currently, outweigh the performance troubles. There's simply a _much_ lower cost to iterate quickly on a web-driven application. That said, we're all frustrated about the performance implications (users and companies alike), and this this is reflected in the direction the industry is taking. I predict Electron _will_ become less popular in the next year or two as React Native desktop support becomes proven by one or more major players: - Linux: https://github.com/CanonicalLt
Read the rest
d/react-native - OS X: https://github.com/ptmt/react-native-macos - Windows: https://github.com/Microsoft/react-native-windows
In Electron is flash for the desktop (2016)
automathematics·Apr 11, 2017
So many divisive opinions here, but in case anyone reads this far down, here's my 2 cents: - Yes, desktop apps existed before Electron. But the top comment is right. How many desktop apps. NOT utilities but full featured apps (like Spotify and Atom) that you loved either got swallowed up by other companies (Mailbox) or discontinued due to "lack of use" (read: lack of profitability). I'm sure if you dig deep you can remember quite a few... I'm a game developer with a background in C++. But I'm developing my company's prototype in electron. This is because I can do it myself without needing to tap a bunch of people to help and find funding. I can bootstrap. Electron allows this and it's incredible. I couldn't make a cross platform game engine in a year on three platforms using native. Maybe you can and you're just a better human/coder than
Read the rest
me (but seriously, email me in a year with your progress!) but Electron is allowing it. What does this allow? This allows me to release a product (yay) and maintain a product easily (double yay!) and when you guys don't throw money at me.... I can KEEP maintaining it because of my low overhead. With native code and a staff of 20 I would be forced to shut down the product. THAT BEING SAID If the game does well? I'm not only using Electron, I'm using React (yes, it's a game. Yes I know, I've had this discussion. I'm crazy) so the next step is to port it to react native on the desktop and remove the Electron dependency. Totally doable since Microsoft is supporting it on the Univ. Windows Platform (https://github.com/Microsoft/react-native-windows) but macOS? Someone's working on it but it's of course not apple (https://github.com/ptmt/react-native-macos). Ubuntu is on top of shit though (https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/blog/2016/08/05/introducing-...) I can't speak for Spotify or Slack or any of the people mentioned (yes I know Spotify isn't using electron) but for a small company of 1 and a half people Electron is allowing innovation and project completion in a way that nothing else is for me. It's a great door to open to allow future optimizations. And hey, maybe Electron will slim down too... give it time. Remember how bad Windows development was? No? I do. But .NET has come a long way, maybe electron will too. If not, we can always port!
In Electron is flash for the desktop (2016)

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