Frontend System Design of Newsfeed

Now that we’ve discussed the requirements of the newsfeed system, let’s look at its key design aspects. This lesson is structured in a progressive way to approach the design process. This approach helps us design the frontend system methodically, as each section builds on the previous one. The structure is given below:

Let’s start with exploring the design patterns and architectures.

Design patterns and architectures

A Newsfeed application requires a highly scalable and performant frontend to handle dynamic content updates, infinite scrolling, personalized feeds, and real-time interactions. Different design patterns and architectures influence how efficiently the application works, as follows:

• MVC vs. MVVM: Model-View-Controller (MVC) structures UI and logic together, which can lead to performance bottlenecks when updating dynamic feeds. Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM) separates UI from data management and business logic, enabling efficient updates as new posts appear while keeping the UI responsive. Therefore, MVVM is the best choice for managing real-time feed updates.

• SPA vs. MPA: Single-page applications (SPAs) enable instant content updates, making them ideal for a continuously updating newsfeed. Multi-page applications (MPAs) introduce page reloads when navigating between posts or sections, reducing engagement. We prefer the SPA model because the newsfeed must support infinite scrolling, dynamic content loading, and real-time updates.

• Micro-frontend vs. monolithic: For large-scale social media platforms, micro-frontends allow independent teams to manage sections like feeds, comments, and notifications separately. However, a monolithic SPA is better for most newsfeeds due to faster performance, simpler state management, and reduced inter-module dependencies. Additionally, a monolithic SPA allows seamless client-side rendering, efficient data fetching, and consistent UI updates. Therefore, we’ll opt for a monolithic SPA to design a newsfeed frontend.

• Component-based design: Newsfeeds rely on reusable UI components like posts, comments, buttons, and share options. A component-based approach ensures efficient rerenders, modular development, and better performance when displaying dynamic content.

• Data flow: A newsfeed requires a hybrid approach—unidirectional flow for loading and managing posts and bidirectional flow for real-time updates, ensuring efficient state management and responsiveness.

The following table summarizes the design decisions for the Newsfeed Frontend System Design:

Let’s explore the components for the newsfeed frontend.

Components for the newsfeed

Based on our defined scope, this section will outline the essential components needed for the newsfeed frontend System Design. We’ll break down the system into smaller, reusable user interface (UI) components, such as the story viewer, comment section, or toolbar, to be developed, tested, and optimized independently for a newsfeed system. This reduces redundancy, as common elements like the toolbar can be reused across different system parts (e.g., in the comment section and post view).

Let’s discuss the components of a newsfeed frontend system:

• Story component: This component displays user stories at the top of the newsfeed. It’s modular, showing a carousel of stories users can scroll through. It helps keep the newsfeed clean and organized.

• Toolbar component: A reusable component that includes essential actions like liking, sharing, commenting, saving posts, and active engagement numbers.

• Comment component: This component handles the display and interaction of comments. It uses the toolbar component to allow users to like or dislike comments, providing consistent functionality.

• Create post component: This is a separate ...