MERN Stack vs MEAN Stack: The Ultimate Comparison Guide
Are you confused about which one to choose between the MERN stack and the MEAN stack for success in this highly demanding web application industry? Both these stack development technologies are highly demanding and rapidly transforming each day.
Have you ever thought about which one is highly suitable for your web application requirements? Choosing the right one can be pretty challenging, especially when you have just started your career in web development. You are not sure about their pros and cons.
In this blog post, I will cover the ultimate comparison guide of the MERN stack vs MEAN stack in a straightforward and easy manner. I am hopeful that you will have a clear and solid understanding of both of them and how different they are from each other at the end of this article.
This blog post will help you make wise decisions whether you are developing robust web applications or one-stop solutions for businesses.
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Table of Contents
MERN Stack vs MEAN Stack: At a Glance
You might have noticed that both the MEAN stack and MERN stack are excellent technologies for modern web stack development. They deliver a complete set of advanced technologies for developing stunning and user-intuitive websites.
The web development process has become easier with the application of these stacks, which assist web developers in using JavaScript continuously. You can choose the one that best fits the demands of your web development project by becoming more informed of their differences.
What is MERN Stack?
MERN stack is the specific framework that creates web applications entirely based on JavaScript. The four major components of the MERN stack are MongoDB, Express.js, React, and Node.js.
MongoDB manages the database, while the backend is managed by Express.js, React helps in building stunning user interfaces, and the server side is managed by Node.js. MERN stack is highly recommended for developing intuitive, fast, and scalable single-page web applications.
What is MEAN Stack?
Another popular full-stack framework that is wholly based on JavaScript is the MEAN stack. The major components of the MEAN stack are MongoDB, Express.js, Angular, and Node.js.
Just like MERNstack, backend services are handled by Express, MongoDB manages the database, and Server-side functions are handled by Node.js.
Angular creates a significant difference by developing stunning user interfaces. This helps a web application become highly suitable for enterprise-level web applications.
MERN Stack vs MEAN Stack: Major Differences?
Let’s elaborate on the difference between the MERN stack and the MEAN stack below. I have tried to shed light on the critical elements of both stack frameworks so that you can decide which one fits best for your web development project.
Let’s explore the excellent factors below;
1. Scalability
Greater scalability is offered by MERN Stack, especially for web applications that are versatile and highly depend upon data. As your development project grows, you can quickly scale your total data storage using the flexible NoSQL database of MongoDB.
Along with this, the MERN stack is highly recommended for projects such as social media platforms that demand real-time collaboration, interaction, and prompt updates. MEAN Stack, on the contrary, gives scalability as well, yet it is often the best fit for larger business applications that need a more stunning backend configuration and highly structured data.
2. Language
MERN stack and MEAN stack are similar in primary language as they both apply JavaScript widely. Although, the front-end framework is the place where the significant difference is found.
With the help of React, which highly depends on JavaScript and JSX, web developers can generate HTML and JavaScript together at the MERN stack. Yet, MEAN uses Angular, a complete front-end framework that too uses TypeScripts, which is a JavaScript superset, to boost code manageability while implementing type-checking.
3. Front-end Framework
React is the primary front-end framework applied by MERN Stack, which concentrates on developing user interfaces with functional elements. React is highly flexible, lightweight, and ideal for swiftly developing highly interactive user interfaces.
On the contrary, MEAN uses Angular widely, a more comprehensive framework that offers additional elements and functionalities such as two-way data binding, directives, and dependency injection. More significantly, enterprise-level applications with highly complex requirements are highly recommended for Angular.
4. Architecture
While their architectural framework is different from one another, the MERN stack and the MEAN stack both offer one-stop, full-stack solutions for complex web application issues. MERN is famous for its flexibility and advanced modular design, which help web developers modify their architecture to meet the demands of a web development project.
By focusing on well-built MVC frameworks for better code organization, the MEAN stack, on the contrary, has a highly complex design. For enterprise-level development projects where scalability and manageability are essential, the MEAN stack is absolutely perfect.
The architectural tactics applied by the MERN and MEAN stacks differentiate from one another. With a primary focus on React elements for developing robust user interfaces, the MERN stack has a highly flexible design. Developers can usually able to separate the application into reusable elements due to this.
Because MEAN follows the Model-View-Controller (MVC) design, it is highly organized and best fit for large-scale web applications. The division of issues is highlighted in the architecture of MERN, where each element of the web application has a distinct role. The three-tier architecture is used widely in the MERN stack for the development of stunning web applications.
5. Third-Party Support
There is a large set of third-party support with MERN Stack, especially for React, which encourages the integration of other tools, APIs, and libraries. For the further betterment of functionality and user experience, web developers have complete access to a vast variety of resources.
On the other hand, the third-party support of the MEAN stack is also extensive and robust. But, as compared to the complexity of Angular, React offers higher pre-built integrations. However, the need for third-party support is often decreased by the integrated features and stunning ecosystem of Angular.
The MERN stack is more popular than the MEAN stack. Hence, it has a large community of web developers who are developing highly functional plugins and tools to assist it.
6. Security
While talking about security, web application security is highly supported by both the stack development frameworks, MERN stack and MEAN stack. Both of them offer security features like encryption, authentication and authorization for a more secure user interface.
Due to Angular’s highly organized framework, MEAN Stack offers robust built-in features such as protection against Cross-site Scripting (XSS) threats and sanitization.
On the other hand, the MERN Stack offers security elements as well; various features, such as data protection, generally depend on third-party support and tools. In comparison to the built-in features of the MEAN stack, the security feature of the MERN stack needs complete manual execution.
7. Productivity
Usually, MERN Stack allows web developers to become highly productive, mainly because React’s component-based architecture makes it easier to develop stunning user interfaces quickly. Its flexibility also allows web developers to choose the most suitable tools for specific performance. While offering a more structured framework with Angular, MEAN Stack can take a longer time to set up and manage, but it has in-built solutions for common developmental problems, which can boost the overall productivity and functionality of teams.
In summary, they both increase productivity with the help of single programming language usage.
8. Features
MEAN Stack is perfect for businesses and large-scale web applications due to its comprehensive set of features. By incorporating tools for routing, form validation, dependency injection, and HTTP services it boosts the requirements for additional frameworks.
MERN Stack being the feature-rich framework, offers greater adaptability, helping web developers to integrate third-party applications for specific reasons. Generally, MERN performs better for smaller to mid-sized web applications where collaboration and performance are the primary concerns.
9. User Experience
You might have noticed that the MERN stack is perfect for a smooth and prompt user experience due to the functional rendering of UI elements of React. The virtual DOM of React offers the guarantee that UI is shown without reloading the whole application, boosting the user experience and responsiveness of the application.
On the other hand, MEAN stack also offers a stunning user experience with the help of Angular. But sometimes, the heavy framework and two-way data binding of the MEAN stack can lead to delayed performance, particularly in large-scale web applications.
10. Learning Curve
Due to the ease of application and flexibility of the React framework, MERN Stack provides a more gentle learning curve. The majority of web developers can simply get an idea of the component-based architecture of React if they are already familiar with the JavaScript framework.
However, because of the complexity of Angular, MEAN Stack has a more steeper learning curve as compared to the gentle one of MERN stack. For larger web application projects, Angular is very challenging to work with due to its extensive set of built-in features, which are highly complex to configure.
Due to its multiple complex features, it is optional rather than essential to web developers. This framework needs detailed approaches such as dependency injection and TypeScript.
11. Back-end Framework
The back end of MERN Stack is developed with Express.js and Node.js, which provide a lightweight, event-based, non-blocking setting that is perfect for developing scalable web applications. These frameworks are ideal for generating effective and fast APIs.
However, Node.js and Express are useful frameworks for the MEAN stack and are getting practical benefits from using the structured framework of Angular. Suppose it offers hassle-free interaction with the help of its backend framework. Both the MEAN stack and the MERN stack are highly beneficial, although the MERN stack is more flexible as compared to the other one.
12. Data-binding
Due to Angular’s two-way data binding feature in the MEAN stack, it updates the view automatically when the data model changes. MEAN stack is highly recommended for web applications that demand real-time updates.
On the other hand, a unidirectional data flow of the MERN stack helps to flow data in one direction, that is, from the model to the view. This unidirectional data-binding approach leads to simple debugging and offers well-optimized performance in enterprise-level applications. However, they need higher attempts for synchronization.
MERN Stack vs MEAN Stack: Which Is Better?
Based on the requirements of your web application project, you can select between the MERN stack and the MEAN stack. MERN stack is highly suitable for developers who need stunning user interfaces, ease of application, higher speed, and flexibility. Developing highly intuitive and responsive single-page web applications becomes easier because of the simplicity of React and the lightweight design of the stack.
Yet, bigger, enterprise-level web applications are the best fit for the MEAN stack. Angular is a great choice for web application projects that require a huge number of in-built tools, scalability, and sustainability due to its structured architecture and outstanding features. If you aim to develop a complex and large-scale web application, MEAN is the best fit for you. MERN can be a better option for faster, smaller web application projects that showcase functionality and user experience.
Wrapping Up,
With the above comparison of the MERN stack and MEAN stack, you can get an idea that each stack has its own advantages and disadvantages. However, the MERN stack is highly popular due to its ease of accessibility and simple user interface.
I hope the contrast that I made between the MERN stack vs MEAN stack is clearly illustrated in this blog, along with their key elements.
The major difference lies between their distinct architecture and learning curve. They both have similarities in third-party support, scalability, language and more.
If you have any queries regarding them or wish to add some more contrasting elements to the above list, feel free to state them in the below comments section.
Happy reading.
