Sunsetting Redux Saga

With the emergence of new ideas, approaches, and technologies, Redux Saga has become an unnecessary library. Let’s explore the reasons why it is not advisable to use Redux Saga in new projects or to remove it from existing ones.

Reasons to get rid of redux-saga

1. Increased Complexity: Redux Saga introduces additional layers of abstraction, making the codebase more intricate and harder to maintain, especially as applications grow larger.

2. Steep Learning Curve: Learning Redux Saga can be time-consuming, and it may take longer for new team members to understand and contribute effectively to the project.

3. Reduced Code Readability: Complex sagas and generators can lead to reduced code readability, making it challenging to understand the flow of asynchronous operations.

4. Additional Dependencies: Incorporating Redux Saga adds extra dependencies to the project, increasing the bundle size and potentially affecting application performance.

5. Debugging Challenges: Debugging sagas can be more complex compared to simpler alternatives, leading to slower issue resolution and development inefficiencies.

6. Limited Flexibility: While Redux Saga is powerful, it may not be the most flexible solution for all projects, and it could hinder the implementation of certain features or optimizations.

7. Maintenance Overhead: The maintenance cost of a Redux Saga-based architecture can become substantial as the application evolves, requiring significant effort to keep the codebase up-to-date and bug-free.

8. Performance Overhead: Redux Saga’s advanced concurrency control and task cancellation come at a performance cost, potentially impacting application responsiveness and user experience.

9. Better Alternatives: With advancements in state management libraries and patterns, there are now simpler and more efficient alternatives that offer similar functionality without the downsides of Redux Saga.

10. Unnecessary for Smaller Projects: For smaller applications with straightforward state management requirements, incorporating Redux Saga may be overkill and add unnecessary complexity.

11. Type Inference Limitations: TypeScript’s type inference may not work optimally with some patterns used in Redux Saga. This can lead to situations where developers need to add explicit type annotations, reducing the benefits of TypeScript’s automatic type inference. About importance of TypeScript’s automatic type inference I wrote here.

What to pick then?

• RTK Query: If your focus is on data fetching and caching, Redux Toolkit’s RTK Query is a powerful option. It is designed for managing API data and provides built-in support for caching, pagination, and other common API-related features.

• React Query: While not directly related to Redux, React Query is another excellent data-fetching library that can be used in conjunction with Redux or independently for handling asynchronous data fetching and caching.