The main advantages of Vue.js are that it is quick to learn, it can be added to an existing system one page at a time, and its core tools all come from the same team. Its main disadvantages are a smaller pool of developers than React and a history of one painful major upgrade. This article sets out both, for someone deciding whether a business application should be built on it.
What Vue.js is in 2026
Vue (pronounced “view”) is a JavaScript framework for building user interfaces: the screens, forms and tables of a web application. It was created by Evan You in 2014 and is released under the MIT licence, which allows free commercial use. Unlike Angular, which belongs to Google, Vue is an independent project maintained by a core team of full-time and volunteer contributors and led by its creator.
The current major version is Vue 3. It was released in September 2020, has been the default since early 2022, and the latest stable release is 3.5. Vue 2 reached end of life on 31 December 2023 and is no longer fixed. Much of what is written about Vue online, including the earlier version of this article, describes Vue 2.
The advantages
It is quick to learn
A Vue component is written as a template that looks like ordinary HTML, with the logic and styling for that component kept in the same file. A developer who knows HTML, CSS and JavaScript can read a Vue component on the first day. For the business, that shortens the time before a new developer, or a new supplier, is useful.
It can be adopted a page at a time
This is the advantage that matters most to owners of existing systems. Vue’s documentation describes a range of ways to use it:
- as a single script added to a page that the server already produces, with no build step, to make one form or table interactive;
- as self-contained components embedded in an existing application;
- as a full single-page application, where Vue controls every screen;
- as a server-rendered application, using the Nuxt framework.
An older web application can therefore be improved screen by screen without stopping to rewrite it. That suits staged modernisation, where the system stays in use throughout.
The core tools come from one team
Page routing (Vue Router), shared data (Pinia), the build tool (Vite), the editor extension and the browser debugging tools are all maintained by the Vue team or its members and documented together. A React project has to choose each of these from competing options. Fewer choices means Vue projects tend to resemble each other, so a developer moving between them has less to relearn.
It is small and fast
Vue’s documentation puts the size of a minimal application at around 16 kB once compressed, and describes Vue 3 as one of the most performant mainstream frameworks. For a business application, the practical meaning is that the framework itself is rarely the reason a screen is slow. Slow screens usually trace back to the database or to how much data is being requested.
It is stable and independently run
Vue 3 has been available since 2020, and the team has added features in minor releases while avoiding breaking changes. The older style of writing components, the Options API, is still supported and the team says it has no plan to remove it. Because no single company owns Vue, its direction does not depend on one firm’s commercial priorities.
Where Vue is weaker
The hiring pool is smaller. In our experience there are noticeably more React developers on the UK market than Vue developers. Vue’s learning curve softens this, since a competent React or Angular developer can pick it up, but it is a real consideration if you plan to recruit.
The Vue 2 to Vue 3 upgrade was hard. Vue 3 contained breaking changes, and many third-party libraries had to be rewritten. Some business applications are still on Vue 2 for that reason, running without security fixes. The Vue team has been careful since, but it is a fair mark against the record.
There is no large company behind it. Independence cuts both ways. Vue relies on sponsorship and on its core team. It has been sustained that way for more than a decade, which is some reassurance, but it is a different kind of backing from Google’s for Angular.
Mobile apps need third-party tools. React has React Native for building iPhone and Android apps. Vue has no equivalent from its core team. The Vue documentation points to tools such as Ionic Vue and Quasar instead.
The ecosystem is smaller. There are generally fewer ready-made component libraries and integrations for Vue than for React. The well-known ones are good, but a niche requirement is more likely to need building.
When Vue suits a business system
Vue tends to be a good choice when:
- an existing server-rendered application needs more interactive screens without a rewrite;
- the team is small and wants one well-documented way to do each thing;
- the application is mostly forms, lists and dashboards used by staff or customers in a browser.
It tends to be the wrong choice when:
- you need iPhone and Android apps that share code with the web application;
- you are building a very large application with many teams and want a framework that enforces a single structure, where Angular is stronger;
- your supplier or in-house team already works in React or Angular. Their experience is worth more than the differences between the frameworks.
For a side-by-side view, see our Angular vs React vs Vue comparison.
What to check before you commit
If a supplier proposes Vue, or you already own a Vue application, four checks tell you most of what you need to know:
- Which version is it? Open
package.jsonin the source code and find thevueentry. Anything beginning with 2 is out of support and needs a plan. Our page on unsupported software explains how to judge the urgency. - Is it built the current way? A Vue 3 application should use Vite, Pinia and the Composition API. Our five best practices for developing with Vue describes what to expect.
- Who else could maintain it? Ask whether the code follows the official style guide and has automated tests. Both make a handover realistic.
- Do you hold the source code? Whatever the framework, you should have the code, the build instructions and access to the accounts it is deployed from.