Web Development In 2025: Ai’s React Bias Vs. Native Web

There was a further displacement distant from complexity successful web improvement this year, pinch frontend frameworks for illustration Astro and Svelte gaining fame arsenic much developers looked for solutions beyond nan React ecosystem. Meanwhile, autochthonal web level features proved they’re up to nan occupation of building blase web applications — pinch CSS successful peculiar improving complete 2025.

That each said, possibly nan biggest web improvement inclination of this twelvemonth was nan emergence of AI-assisted coding — which, it turned out, is prone to defaulting to React and nan starring React framework, Next.js. Because React dominates nan frontend landscape, ample connection models (LLMs) person had a batch of React codification to train on.

Let’s look successful much item astatine 5 of nan biggest web improvement trends of 2025.

1. The Rise of Native Web Features

Over 2025, a number of autochthonal web features softly caught up to nan functionality offered by JavaScript frameworks. For instance, nan View Transition API — which enables your website to animate smoothly betwixt pages — became portion of nan Baseline 2025 scale of cross-browser support. So it’s now wide disposable for web developers to use.

Baseline is simply a task coordinated by nan WebDX Community Group astatine nan W3C, which includes representatives from Google, Mozilla, Microsoft and different organizations. It’s only been moving since 2023, but this twelvemonth it really came into its own arsenic a useful assets for practicing web developers.

As The New Stack’s Mary Branscombe reported successful June, location are plentifulness of ways to support way of what’s becoming portion of baseline:

“Google’s Web.Dev has a monthly update connected Baseline features and news, nan WebDX features explorer lets you position features that are Limited Availability, Newly Available aliases Widely Available; and nan monthly merchandise notes screen what features person reached a caller baseline status.”

From a web functionality perspective, there’s really nary excuse immoderate much to not usage autochthonal web features. As long-time web developer Jeremy Keith put it recently, frameworks are “limiting nan anticipation abstraction of what you tin do successful web browsers today.” In a follow-up post, Keith urged developers to particularly extremity utilizing React successful nan browser because of nan record size costs to nan user. Instead, he encouraged devs to “investigate what you tin do pinch vanilla JavaScript successful nan browser.”

2. AI Coding Assistants Default to React

This year, AI became a modular portion of nan web improvement toolchain (albeit 1 not ever endorsed by developers, particularly those who socialize connected Mastodon aliases Bluesky alternatively of X aliases LinkedIn). Whether aliases not you’re an AI instrumentality successful exertion development, location is 1 large concern: nan propensity of LLMs to default to React and Next.js.

When OpenAI’s GPT-5 was released successful August, 1 of its purported strengths was coding. GPT-5 initially sewage very mixed reviews from developers, truthful astatine that time, I reached retired to OpenAI to inquire them astir nan coding features. Ishaan Singal, a interrogator astatine OpenAI, responded by email.

I noted to Singal that successful nan GPT-5 prompting guide, location are 3 recommended frameworks: Next.js (TypeScript), React and HTML. Was location immoderate collaboration pinch nan Next.js and React task teams, I asked, to optimize GPT-5 for those frameworks?

“We picked these frameworks based connected their fame and commonality, but we did not collaborate straight pinch nan Next.js aliases React teams connected GPT-5,” he replied.

We cognize that Vercel, nan institution that shepherds nan Next.js framework, is simply a instrumentality of GPT-5. On motorboat day, it called GPT-5 “the champion frontend AI model.” So location is simply a bully quid pro quo happening present — GPT-5 was capable to go an master successful Next.js because of its popularity, which presumably increases its fame moreover more. That helps some OpenAI and Vercel.

“At nan extremity of nan day, it is nan developer’s choice,” Singal concluded, regarding which web technologies a dev wants to use. “But established repos person amended support from nan community. This immunodeficiency developers successful self-serve maintenance.”

3. Emergence of Web Apps successful AI Agents and Chatbots

This year, we saw nan emergence of mini-web applications wrong AI chatbots and agents.

MCP-UI was nan first motion that nan web would beryllium a cardinal portion of AI agents. As nan sanction suggests, MCP-UI uses nan celebrated Model Context Protocol arsenic a connection foundation. The project “aims to standardize really models and devices tin petition nan show of rich | HTML interfaces wrong a customer application.”

In an question and reply successful August, nan 2 founders (one of whom worked astatine Shopify astatine nan time) explained that location are 2 types of SDKs for MCP-UI: a customer SDK and a server SDK to link to MCP servers. The server SDK is disposable successful TypeScript, Ruby and Python.

MCP-UI sounded promising, but it was quickly overshadowed by OpenAI’s Apps SDK, which launched successful early October. Apps SDK allows third-party developers to build web-based applications that tally arsenic interactive components wrong ChatGPT conversations — reminding galore of america of erstwhile Apple launched its App Store successful 2008.

The defining trait of Apps SDK is its web-based UI exemplary (similar to MCP-UI). A ChatGPT app constituent is simply a web UI that runs successful a sandboxed iframe wrong a ChatGPT conversation. ChatGPT acts arsenic nan big of nan app. You tin deliberation of a third-party ChatGPT app arsenic a “mini web app” embedded straight into ChatGPT’s interface.

By nan extremity of October, manufacture heavyweights for illustration Vercel had figured retired really to use their JavaScript frameworks to build ChatGPT apps. Vercel’s speedy integration of Next.js pinch nan ChatGPT apps level shows that AI chatbots won’t conscionable beryllium constricted to lightly interactive widgets — blase web apps will unrecorded connected these platforms, too.

4. Web AI and On-Device Inference successful nan Browser

A parallel improvement complete 2025 was nan emergence successful running client-side AI successful nan browser, which allows LLM conclusion to hap on-device. Google was particularly salient successful this trend; and its word for it is “Web AI.” Jason Mayes, who leads these initiatives astatine Google, defines Web AI arsenic “the creation of moving immoderate instrumentality learning exemplary aliases work wholly client-side connected nan user’s instrumentality via nan web browser.”

In November, Google held an invitation-only arena called nan Google Web AI Summit. Afterwards, I said to Mayes, nan event’s organizer and MC. He explained that a cardinal exertion is LiteRT.js, Google’s Web AI runtime that targets accumulation web applications. It builds connected LiteRT, which is designed to tally instrumentality learning (ML) models straight connected devices (mobile, embedded, aliases edge) alternatively than relying connected unreality inference.

In a keynote position astatine nan Web AI Summit, Parisa Tabriz, vice president and wide head for Chrome and nan web ecosystem astatine Google, highlighted nan built-in AI APIs that were added to Chrome past August, on pinch nan merchandise of Gemini Nano — Google’s main on-device exemplary — arsenic a built-in characteristic successful Chrome past June. These and different web technologies are driving nan existent Web AI trend.

Another invention that Google was progressive in, alongside Microsoft, was the merchandise of WebMCP, which lets devs power really AI agents interact pinch websites utilizing client-side JavaScript. In a September question and reply pinch Kyle Pflug, group merchandise head for nan web level astatine Microsoft Edge, he explained that “the halfway conception is to let web developers to specify ‘tools’ for their website successful JavaScript, analogous to nan devices that would beryllium provided by a accepted MCP server.”

Web AI isn’t conscionable being promoted by commercialized companies. The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is besides exploring building blocks for “the agentic web,” which includes utilizing MCP-UI, WebMCP and another emerging modular called NLWeb (developed astatine Microsoft).

5. The ‘Vite-ification’ of nan JavaScript Ecosystem

It whitethorn sound for illustration AI dominated web improvement this twelvemonth — and it did, actually. But frontend tooling besides saw its stock of innovation. One merchandise successful peculiar stood out.

Vite, created by Evan You, has go nan go-to build instrumentality for modern frontend frameworks, including Vue, SvelteKit, Astro and React — pinch experimental support besides from Remix and Angular. In an question and reply pinch The New Stack successful September, You told maine that nan cardinal to Vite’s occurrence was its early usage of ES Modules (ESM), a standardized JavaScript module strategy that allows you to “break up JavaScript codification into different pieces, different modules that you tin load.”

You and his company, VoidZero, are now building Vite+, a caller unified JavaScript toolchain that intends to lick JavaScript fragmentation. At this year’s ViteConf event, You officially unveiled Vite+ and positioned it arsenic an endeavor improvement toolkit. He said it includes “everything you emotion astir Vite — positive everything you’ve been duct-taping together.”

A Crossroads for Web Development

At nan extremity of 2025, it feels for illustration we’re astatine a crossroads successful frontend development. On nan 1 hand, there’s a measurement retired of nan React complexity conundrum: Use autochthonal web features and devices for illustration Astro that easiness nan load connected users. While that was so a inclination this year, it’s successful threat of being overshadowed successful 2026 by our expanding reliance connected AI devices for coding — which, arsenic noted, thin to trust connected React.

The truth is, astir developers now — including nan hundreds of thousands of “vibe coders” who antecedently had not been portion of nan developer ecosystem — will proceed to beryllium fed React codification by AI systems. That makes it moreover much imperative for nan web improvement organization to proceed to endorse and advocator for autochthonal web codification adjacent year.

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