WHICH IS BEST FOR BACKEND DEVELOPMENT?

Which Works Better For You — Golang Or Node.js?

This article is a good read for you, if you are struggling with what is best backend tool for your app project — Golang or Node.js.

We can compare the web development process with an iceberg. In the Iceberg, the only tip can be seen, and the other part remains unseen. That is the same with web or app development. A user can see a specific part of the application, and the rest of the part remains unseen. This unseen part is known as the “back end,” mystical and imperceptible.

When it comes to selecting the technology for backend development, you will end with a plethora of options available like Golang, Node.js, PHP, Python, Ruby, and many more. Deciding without knowing the important facts about these technologies can be burdensome within this diversity.

To help you out, let’s compare Golang and Nodejs, relatively new backend programming languages.

Brief Introduction of Golang

Go language from Google is fresh and scrappy. It has made its debut in the year of 2011 as an open-source language. It is a general-purpose, multi-paradigm, compiled, and statically-typed programming language.

It is a lightweight language that makes it best suited for microservices software architectures. It offers various features such as typing indicator, operator overloading, and typing inheritance.

Code in Golang is speedy because of memory management as it has deferred garbage collection. Golang is very similar to the C programming language that helps to develop reliable, simple, and efficient software easily.

It was revealed in the report of Github that as a programming language, Golang was the fastest growing language in 2019.

Image source

Brief Introduction of Nodejs

Nodejs is a technology for developing Back-end apps with JavaScript. It is powered by the V8 JavaScript engine of Google Chrome. Mainly this technology is lightweight and effective as its non/blocking and event-driven I/O model.

It is designed to develop scalable, networked apps. Using some complex optimizations, it compiles JavaScript code to native machine code. V8 also does the garbage collection and memory allocation of Javascript objects.

85% of the developers revealed that they are happy with using Nodejs for building JavaScript-based web apps.

Image Source

Which works Better For You — Golang or Nodejs?

Now that you have the basic information about Golang and Node.js let’s compare them to find out which one of them works better for you.

#1. Golang vs. NodeJS: Scalability

Golang offers more scalability than Nodejs. The reason is that Golang comes with GOroutines that help to handle parallel threads reliably effectively. Whereas Nodejs has less functional scalability. Therefore, because of its weaker parallel process, Nodejs is not recommended for large projects.

#2. Golang vs. Node JS: Concurrency

Golang is ideal for large software projects requiring multiple requests to be handled simultaneously because concurrency is a strong side of Go. It offers a lightweight thread communication mechanism that enables programmers to function concurrently. Thus, using Golang users can run their functions at the same time.

But, that’s not the case for NodeJS because it is single-threaded & uses event-callback mechanism. Hence, concurrency cannot be achieved as everything has to be done in a linear order.

#3. Golang vs. NodeJS: Development Tools

Golang comes with decent packages and libraries still, there are less development tools compared to NodeJS. One needs to have experience in manual configuration & has to conduct in-depth research while planning to master Golang.

On the other hand, Nodejs comes with an extensive range of libraries, frameworks, and tools for programmers to develop applications. Additionally, there is extended support for all kinds of development tasks from the huge JavaScript community.

#4. Golang vs. NodeJS: Ease of Learning

It is well known that JavaScript is the most widely used language by programmers. Thus, Node.js would be an easy rope to climb with if you have good sound knowledge of JavaScript.

And even if you are a beginner, you will find sufficient help from the community that is ever ready to share their resources and experience.

Though Golang is not that difficult to learn, compared to Nodejs, it is not a very familiar programming language. Thus you need to be ready to learn this language having its own set of rules.

#4. Golang vs. NodeJS: Performance Basis

NodeJS is a JavaScript runtime environment that is on a slower side when it comes to comparison with Golang. Compared to NodeJS, Golang performs much better. Because of JavaScript, the former cannot offer the same ideal service as CPU bound memory.

#5. Golang vs. NodeJS: Error handling

There is a unique approach for handling errors in Golang because it calls for explicit error checking with the code written. But it offers flawless results and higher consistency if we look at the positive side.

Many times, error handling can be inconsistent in Nodejs. And on a positive note, compared to Golang, it provides clear and better error handling with a common throw-catch handling technique.

#6. Golang vs. NodeJS: Community Support

One of the major factors that make developers choose Nodejs is that it has a vibrant and strong open-source community with thousands of contributors. Moreover, it has support from various top companies, such as PayPal, IBM, Microsoft, etc.

Every year, they organize a Nodejs event to come together as a community and during which they announce all improvements and changes. Currently, Nodejs has reached one billion downloads and around 56K stars on GitHub.

Golang has a relatively younger and smaller community than Nodejs but yes it is growing more each year.

There is a GopherCon event hosted by Google annually, where Golang developers across the world come together to explore and discuss new changes and opportunities.

#7. Benefits offered by Golang

• Clean Coding
• Scalability
• Simple and faster development
• Cross-compiling
• Garbage collection

#8. Benefits offered by NodeJS

• Robust Tech Stack
• Caching
• Highly extensible
• Real-time data streaming
• Fast processing and event model

#9. Brands using Golang

• BBC
• Uber
• Medium
• Basecamp
• Intel
• Google
• Docker
• Heroku

#10. Brands using Nodejs

• Netflix
• Linkedin
• Trello
• PayPal
• Medium
• eBay
• NASA
• Walmart

Final Verdict: Which is better for you — Golang or Nodejs?

It is overwhelming to announce one as a winner after having a rigorous comparison of Golang and Nodejs as both of them have expertise in their own domain.

Golang development company will be the best choice from a performance perspective. And Nodejs is a better choice for the richness of front-end development tools and simplicity.

Still, the decision solely depends on your project requirement.