Top Vue.js frameworks you can consider in 2024

Vue.js frameworks: Vue (pronounced /vjuː/, like view) is a JavaScript framework for building user interfaces. It builds on top of standard HTML, CSS, and JavaScript and provides a declarative, component-based programming model that helps you efficiently develop user interfaces of any complexity.

Basic example of Vue.js;

import { createApp, ref } from 'vue'

createApp({
  setup() {
    return {
      count: ref(0)
    }
  }
}).mount('#app')

<div id="app">
  <button @click="count++">
    Count is: {{ count }}
  </button>
</div>

The above example demonstrates the two core features of Vue:

Declarative Rendering: Vue extends standard HTML with a template syntax that allows us to declaratively describe HTML output based on JavaScript state.
Reactivity: Vue automatically tracks JavaScript state changes and efficiently updates the DOM when changes happen.

You may already have questions – don’t worry. We will cover every little detail in the rest of the documentation. For now, please read along so you can have a high-level understanding of what Vue offers.

Nuxt.js a Vue.js frameworks

Nuxt’s goal is to make web development intuitive and performant with a great Developer Experience in mind.

Nuxt is a free and open-source vue.js framework with an intuitive and extendable way to create type-safe, performant and production-grade full-stack web applications and websites with Vue.js.

We made everything so you can start writing .vue files from the beginning while enjoying hot module replacement in development and a performant application in production with server-side rendering by default.

Nuxt has no vendor lock-in, allowing you to deploy your application everywhere, even on the edge.

<script setup>
useSeoMeta({
  title: 'Meet Nuxt',
  description: 'The Intuitive Vue Framework.'
})
</script>

<template>
  <div id="app">
    <AppHeader />
    <NuxtPage />
    <AppFooter />
  </div>
</template>

<style>
#app {
  background-color: #020420;
  color: #00DC82;
}
</style>

Nuxt uses conventions and an opinionated directory structure to automate repetitive tasks and allow developers to focus on pushing features. The configuration file can still customize and override its default behaviors.

Also read: Bun.js: A Glimpse into the Future of JavaScript Runtimes

File-based routing: define routes based on the structure of your pages/ directory. This can make it easier to organize your application and avoid the need for manual route configuration.
Code splitting: Nuxt automatically splits your code into smaller chunks, which can help reduce the initial load time of your application.
Server-side rendering out of the box: Nuxt comes with built-in SSR capabilities, so you don’t have to set up a separate server yourself.
Auto-imports: write Vue composables and components in their respective directories and use them without having to import them with the benefits of tree-shaking and optimized JS bundles.
Data-fetching utilities: Nuxt provides composables to handle SSR-compatible data fetching as well as different strategies.
Zero-config TypeScript support: write type-safe code without having to learn TypeScript with our auto-generated types and tsconfig.json
Configured build tools: we use Vite by default to support hot module replacement (HMR) in development and bundling your code for production with best-practices baked-in.

Nuxt takes care of these and provides both frontend and backend functionality so you can focus on what matters: creating your web application.

Learn more: https://nuxt.com/

Vuetify

Get started with Vuetify, the world’s most popular Vue.js framework for building feature rich, blazing fast applications.

Vuetify is a Vue.js framework that helps to create beautiful and responsive user interfaces. It includes a wide variety of customizable and reusable components for building modern applications.

Vuetify is a free to use Open Source project released under the MIT license.
Vuetify is a framework that is built on top of Vue.js. It is a collection of components that can be used to build applications. Vue.js is a JavaScript framework that is used to build user interfaces.
You can use Vuetify with other CSS frameworks, but it is typically not recommended. If you are integrating Vuetify into an existing application that is using another CSS framework, you may want to disable the default color and utility generation. See the SASS Variables page for more information.
Vuetify supports server-side rendering. Set the ssr property to true in your vuetify configuration object.

import { createVuetify } from 'vuetify'

export default createVuetify({
  ssr: true,
})

Learn more: https://vuetifyjs.com/en/

Quasar Framework a Vue.js frameworks

Quasar (pronounced /ˈkweɪ.zɑɹ/) is an MIT licensed open-source Vue.js based framework, which allows you as a web developer to quickly create responsive++ websites/apps in many flavours:

SPAs (Single Page App)
SSR (Server-side Rendered App) (+ optional PWA client takeover)
PWAs (Progressive Web App)
BEX (Browser Extension)
Mobile Apps (Android, iOS, …) through Cordova or Capacitor
Multi-platform Desktop Apps (using Electron)

Quasar’s motto is: write code once and simultaneously deploy it as a website, a Mobile App and/or an Electron App. Yes, one codebase for all of them, helping you develop an app in record time by using a state-of-the-art CLI and backed by best-practice, blazing fast Quasar web components.

When using Quasar, you won’t need additional heavy libraries like Hammer.js, Moment.js or Bootstrap. It’s got those needs covered internally, and all with a small footprint!

Its features:

It’s based on Vue.js
You get a state-of-the-art UI (that follows Material Guidelines) for your websites and apps out of the box
Best support for desktop and mobile browsers (including iOS Safari!) out of the box
Best-in-class support for each build mode (SPA, SSR, PWA, Mobile app, Desktop app & Browser Extension) and the best developer experience through a tight integration with our own CLI
It’s easily customizable (CSS) and extendable (JS)
It’s the most performance-focused framework
It’s tree-shakable automatically
Incredible community on our Forum and Discord chat
Has a regular release cycle inclusive of new features
Gets quick fixes and listens to the community’s requests
Handles the whole development experience (including even creating your app’s icons and splash screens)

Learn more: https://quasar.dev/

VitePress

VitePress is a Static Site Generator (SSG) designed for building fast, content-centric websites. In a nutshell, VitePress takes your source content written in Markdown, applies a theme to it, and generates static HTML pages that can be easily deployed anywhere.

DocumentationVitePress ships with a default theme designed for technical documentation. It powers this page you are reading right now, along with the documentation for Vite, Rollup, Pinia, VueUse, Vitest, D3, UnoCSS, Iconify and many more.The official Vue.js documentation is also based on VitePress, but uses a custom theme shared between multiple translations.
Blogs, Portfolios, and Marketing SitesVitePress supports fully customized themes, with the developer experience of a standard Vite + Vue application. Being built on Vite also means you can directly leverage Vite plugins from its rich ecosystem. In addition, VitePress provides flexible APIs to load data (local or remote) and dynamically generate routes. You can use it to build almost anything as long as the data can be determined at build time.The official Vue.js blog is a simple blog that generates its index page based on local content.

VitePress is the spiritual successor of VuePress. The original VuePress was based on Vue 2 and webpack. With Vue 3 and Vite under the hood, VitePress provides significantly better DX, better production performance, a more polished default theme, and a more flexible customization API.

The API difference between VitePress and VuePress mostly lies in theming and customization. If you are using VuePress 1 with the default theme, it should be relatively straightforward to migrate to VitePress.

There has also been effort invested into VuePress 2, which also supports Vue 3 and Vite with more compatibility with VuePress 1. However, maintaining two SSGs in parallel isn’t sustainable, so the Vue team has decided to focus on VitePress as the main recommended SSG in the long run.

Developer Experience

VitePress aims to provide a great Developer Experience (DX) when working with Markdown content.

Vite-Powered: instant server start, with edits always instantly reflected (<100ms) without page reload.
Built-in Markdown Extensions: Frontmatter, tables, syntax highlighting… you name it. Specifically, VitePress provides many advanced features for working with code blocks, making it ideal for highly technical documentation.
Vue-Enhanced Markdown: each Markdown page is also a Vue Single-File Component, thanks to Vue template’s 100% syntax compatibility with HTML. You can embed interactivity in your static content using Vue templating features or imported Vue components.

Learn more: https://vitepress.dev/

Gridsome a Jamstack Vue.js framework

Gridsome is a Vue.js powered Jamstack framework for building static generated websites & apps that are fast by default.

Vue.js for frontend – The simplest & most approachable frontend framework.
Data sourcing – Use any Headless CMSs, APIs or Markdown-files for data.
Local development with hot-reloading – See code changes in real-time.
File-based page routing – Any Name.vue file in src/pages is a static route.
Dynamic routing – Any [param].vue file in src/pages is a dynamic route.
Static file generation – Deploy securely to any CDN or static web host.
GraphQL data layer – Simpler data management with a centralized data layer.
Automatic Code Splitting – Builds ultra performance into every page.
Plugin ecosystem – Find a plugin for any job.

How it works:

Gridsome is a Jamstack framework. Jamstack lets you build fast and secure sites and apps delivered by pre-rendering files and serving them directly from a CDN, removing the requirement to manage or run web servers.

Gridsome generates static html that hydrates into a Vue SPA once loaded in the browser. This means you can build both static websites & dynamic apps with Gridsome.

Gridsome builds one .html file and one .json file for every page. After first page load it only uses the .json files to prefetch and load data for the next pages. It also builds a .js bundle for each page that needs it (code splitting).

It uses vue-router for SPA routing, and vue-meta for managing <head>.

Gridsome adds a 57kB min gzip JS bundle size by default.(vue.js, vue-router, vue-meta and some for image lazy loading).

Prerequisites

You should have basic knowledge about HTML, CSS, Vue.js and how to use the Terminal. Knowing how GraphQL works is a plus, but not required. Gridsome is a great way to learn it.

Gridsome requires Node.js (v8.3+) and recommends Yarn

These frameworks offer unique advantages for Vue.js developers in 2024. Whether you’re building large-scale applications or small websites, these tools will help streamline your development process while delivering robust, high-performance projects.