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Webpack vs. Browserify

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  1. Webpack is a module bundler with a major focus on compiling frontend assetslike scripts, stylesheets, and images for production. It compiles CommonJS or ESModules (files with require or import statements) into one or more bundles.

Webpack image

  1. Webpack is more flexible than Browserify because it uses a Javascript config file to define bundling workflows.

  2. Webpack offers features like code splitting and lazy loading out of the box.

  3. Webpack easily integrates with other NodeJS libraries and frameworks without further configuration.

  4. Webpack uses loaders to integrate other languages like .scss and .coffee into the Javascript build system. A .coffee loader will look like this:

{
  module: {
    loaders: [{ test: /\.coffee$/, loader: "coffee-loader" }];
  }
}
  1. Webpack has a wider community than Browserify, with over 58K Github stars.
  1. Browserify is a tool that creates browser-compatible Javascript from a single Javascript file. The Javascript file can import npm modules and other files using require statements. Browserify combines all imported code into one file.

Browserify Landing Image

  1. Browserify is less flexible than Webpack. It uses tools such as Gulp and Grunt to define bundling workflows.

  2. Browserify requires plugins like split-require to perform code splitting.

  3. Browserify may require further configuration to work with npm packages. An example is the deamify transform required to use JQuery.

  4. Browserify uses transforms to integrate with other languages. A Browserify .coffee transform may be defined as:

browserify -t coffeeify main.coffee > bundle.js
  1. Browserify has a smaller community than Webpack, with over 13K Github stars.

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Osinachi Chukwujama
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