What is Next.js? 7 Reasons You Must Use It in 2025 (With a Practical Guide)

Why is Next.js Becoming the Preferred Framework for Developers?

Pain Points of Traditional React Development

❌ SEO-Unfriendly: Single-page applications (SPAs) are not search engine optimization-friendly
❌ Complex Configuration: Routing and server-side rendering require manual setup
❌ Performance Bottlenecks: Long first-page load times negatively impact user experience

The Rise of Next.js

✅ Out-of-the-Box Solutions: Zero-configuration server-side rendering (SSR) and static site generation (SSG)
✅ Extreme Performance Optimization: Automatic code splitting and resource preloading
✅ Native SEO Support: Easily resolves search engine crawling issues

7 Core Advantages of Next.js (With Specific Scenarios)

1. Seamless Switching Between Server-Side Rendering (SSR) and Static Site Generation (SSG)

Scenario: E-commerce product pages need dynamic data (SSR), while blog posts suit pre-rendering (SSG)

Code Example:

export async function getStaticProps() {
  const data = await fetch('https://api.example.com/posts');
  return { props: { data } };
}

### 2. Zero-Configuration Routing System

- **Directory-Based Routing**: pages/about/page.js → /about
- **Dynamic Routing**: pages/posts/[id]/page.js → /posts/123

### 3. Image Optimization (Image Component)

- **Automatic Compression**: Reduces image size by 70%
- **Lazy Loading**: Loads images only when they enter the viewport

### 4. Full-Stack Capabilities

- **API Routes**: Write backend logic directly in the pages/api directory
```jsx
export default function handler(req, res) {
	res.status(200).json({ message: 'Hello from Next.js API!' }); 
}

5. Incremental Static Regeneration (ISR)

Case Study: News websites updating headline content hourly
Configuration: Set revalidate: 3600 in getStaticProps

6. Comprehensive TypeScript Support

One-Click Setup: npx create-next-app@latest --typescript
Type Safety: Automatically generates API response types

7. Robust Ecosystem

Official Plugins: @next/font, @next/bundle-analyzer
Community Templates: Next.js + Tailwind + Prisma One-Click Starter

How to Build a Blog with Next.js in 30 Minutes?

Step-by-Step Guide

Initialize the Project: npx create-next-app@latest
Create Article Pages: Implement dynamic routing in pages/posts/[slug]/page.js
Data Fetching: Use getStaticPaths to pre-generate all article paths
Deploy Online: One-click deployment to Vercel (Next.js’s official platform)

Free Template: Download the Next.js Blog Starter Kit (includes Markdown parsing configuration)

Next.js vs. Other Frameworks: A Table Clarifying the Differences

Feature	Next.js	Gatsby	CRA
Server-Side Rendering	✅	❌	❌
Static Site Generation	✅	✅	❌
Built-In API Routes	✅	❌	❌
Learning Curve	Medium	High	Low

Real Developer Case Study: The Secret Behind a 200% Traffic Increase

Background: After a SaaS platform migrated to Next.js:

First-page load time reduced from 3.2s → 1.1s
Google organic traffic increased by 65%
User retention improved by 40%

Their Advice:

“Use next/image to optimize images and ISR for high-frequency data updates—this is the golden combination for performance and SEO.”

Common Objections and Answers

❓ “Is Next.js suitable for small projects?”
✅ Absolutely! It scales from personal blogs to enterprise-level applications

❓ “Do I need to learn Node.js?”
✅ Not in-depth—API routes only require basic JavaScript knowledge

Take Action Now: Your Next.js Starter Checklist

Read the Official Documentation (prioritize the App Router section)
Join the Next.js Discord Community for real-time support