NodeJs vs Golang: Which Is Best for Your Project? 2022

 It’s essential to have a reliable backend for your applications to run smoothly. However, selecting the best technology stack to meet this requirement is a difficult task. You’ll need tools to build and scale data management, APIs, and less-user-facing code. For several companies, NodeJS was the platform of choice for backend development. Today, this situation has altered, with major corporations such as Uber shifting to Google’s Golang programming language. Here we have compared NodeJs vs Golang for you.

Golang has garnered a lot of popularity in the backend development world since its debut in 2009. On the other hand, NodeJS, which was developed at the same time, has found popularity among programmers due to its cross-platform capabilities. With all of this in mind, how can you choose and select the one that best suits your specific business requirements?

This blog will compare Golang with NodeJS to answer this topic in-depth and assist you in making the best decision for your forthcoming 2022 projects. But first, let’s go through some of the basics.

What is the use of NodeJS?

For package management via browser, experts recommend NodeJS, JavaScript Package Manager (JSPM), Node Package Manager (NPM), and others. It’s used to make back-end web apps and development tools like gulp or grunt for task running and automation, webpack for module management, and so on. Other applications could involve the creation of chatbots and neural networks.

Introduction to Node Js

NodeJS is an open-source JavaScript runtime environment that was created to fulfill the needs of complicated, highly scalable network applications. This environment, which is based on Google Chrome’s V8 JavaScript engine, allows you to create programs that can operate on a variety of platforms, including Linux, macOS, and Windows. NodeJS is written in JavaScript, which allows programmers to use a single language to execute both server-side and client-side coding.

JavaScript has successfully grown over the years with NodeJS to accomplish full-stack development — not just for the frontend but also for the backend. This makes it one of the most popular event-driven platforms for developing web applications.

Not to mention that some of the most well-known firms in the world, including Netflix, Linkedin, Trello, PayPal, and Medium use NodeJS.

Now that we’ve covered the basics of NodeJS, let’s look at its pros and cons.

Pros 

• NodeJS is widely recognized as one of the best platforms for developing scalable apps. 
• You can utilize NodeJS to improve your backend capabilities while simultaneously speeding up your frontend capabilities.
• With JSON support, NodeJS makes it simple for developers to create RESTful APIs for NoSQL databases.
• It has a strong, active, and enthusiastic development community that helps it keep up with the times.
• NodeJS can be used in conjunction with a microservices architecture, making it simple to add new features to your app.

Its minimal weight characteristic allows your developers to accelerate the development process and launch apps more quickly and efficiently.

Cons 

• It is incapable of handling complex computational tasks. 
• Its recurrent, backward-incompatible API changes necessitate extensive code changes. 
• Because Node JS has a small standard library, developers must rely on a lot of third-party libraries. 
• The market is unable to meet the requirement for NodeJS developers.

What is Golang used for?

Go is a programming language that is used to create a variety of applications, particularly for system programming. It is widely used by developers to design high-end modular systems with a focus on speed and security, as well as other large-scale distributed systems. It’s also recognized for being widely used in highly scalable network applications and servers. The language is also useful for developing cloud-based interfaces and associated tasks. Live application platforms, big data/machine learning programs, and microservices are some of the other Golang use cases.

Introduction to Golang

Golang, also known as Go, is an open-source statistically typed programming language created by Google to speed up the delivery of software solutions. It’s a cross-platform, multifunctional language that’s highly recommended for web development, just like NodeJS. It is developer-friendly because it blends the strengths of other languages and overcomes their limits to tackle current and future programming difficulties. It has a simple yet straightforward syntax that allows you to produce legible and maintainable code.

Go is also a structural language that combines the security and speed advantages of C++ /C. It’s based on Python’s speed-of-development ideas, making it a popular choice among programmers all around the world. Its cutting-edge programming tools make developing code more efficient and easy than ever before.

 Numerous tech giants such as Intel, Dropbox, Kubernetes, Docker, Heroku, and others use this language. 

Let’s look into the pros and cons of Golang now:

Pros 

• Static typing underpins Golang, allowing the compiler to quickly uncover entire classes of errors.
• The language supports structural typing (also known as duck typing), which means that any struct can satisfy an interface as long as it includes the required methods. This aids in the decoupling of coding dependencies and the writing of more testable programs.
• Golang contains a large standard library and concrete packages with built-in primitive type functionality that is simple to use.
• This standard library also includes testing support, removing any further reliance.
• Garbage collection makes memory management in Go much easier.
• Concurrent programming becomes much easier, and you can easily create a lightweight thread, known as a ‘goroutine,’ and interact with it via a ‘channel.’

Cons of Go

• The language lacks generics, resulting in copy-paste style of code for certain solutions.
• Unlike Java, Go does not have a tunable garbage collector.
• As a relatively new language, the market is unable to efficiently meet the need for Golang developers.

Discussing the pros and cons is not the only factor that can assist you in making the best decision. As a result, the following section focuses on highlighting the key differences between the two while also emphasizing their uniqueness.

Comparison between NodeJS vs Golang

Performance

Performance is crucial in any scalable system, which is why Node.js is so popular among developers. To give you an idea, below are some of the best Node.js apps. Let’s compare Nodejs vs Golang, which processes faster in terms of raw speed, in addition to improving performance through caching.

The performance of Go is said to be comparable to that of C and C++, which is wonderful as Go compiles its code directly to machine code without the usage of a virtual machine to slow down the compilation process.

In addition, Golang has a built-in garbage collector that automatically frees up unused memory locations, allowing for speedier processing. This functionality also reduces the danger of memory leaking causing security issues.

Node.js, on the other hand, uses V8, the fastest JavaScript engine. Node.js is perfect for event-driven programs that update data in real-time since its code is reusable.

Paypal claims that after switching from Java to Node.js in 2013, their pages were served 200ms faster and their average response time was lowered by 35%.

Node.js with TypeScript is slower than other programming languages since its typing is static. Unlike Go, Node.js cannot conduct CPU and memory-bound tasks, which means that the version of Node.js cannot be as specific — it can perform well or poorly depending on the nature of the project.

In this comparison of performance, Go outperforms Node.js in terms of how rapidly a programming language should compile and execute instructions.

Scalability and Concurrency

In terms of scalability, Google planned to create a programming language for creating heavy and complicated enterprise-scale, production-ready apps. They prioritized scalability and were successful in accomplishing it.

Go uses goroutines, which enable threads to be executed reliably and easily while also allowing them to run concurrently and smoothly. Go is a great scalable programming language because of these goroutines.

Concurrency in Go allows it to process more than 1,000 requests per second. Go surpasses Node.js in terms of scalability and concurrency simply because of its features. It is also important to note that Node.js is a single-threaded asynchronous JavaScript engine.

CPU-bound activities can sometimes stop the event loop in Node.js’ single-threaded architecture, slowing down your program. As a result, your app will be slow and your visitors will not enjoy it.

Go clearly outperforms Node.js in this comparison because it uses goroutines to provide concurrency, resulting in faster operations than Node.js’ single-threaded architecture.

Benchmarks

You may sometimes figure out which tool or language is best by running through various jobs or algorithms and calculating the time, speed, and other factors that every language requires.

In this section, we will look at an example of Nodejs vs Golang performance in a benchmark task. Experiment with various techniques and algorithms for computer languages.

We can see from the statistics that Golang uses less time, memory, and CPU to complete tasks than Node.js.

Difficulty Level

Because it leverages JavaScript, which is widespread among all types of developers and the most frequently used programming language in the world, Nodejs is easier to learn than Golang.

Furthermore, because of the amount of Node.js courses and content available on the internet, Node.js will be easier to learn than Golang if a developer is unfamiliar with JavaScript.

Developers must master Golang’s procedures, concepts, rules, pointers, strict typing, interfaces, coroutines, and other features. The learning curve for Golang developers is often steeper.

Above all, Golang is strictly a backend programming language. As a result, you’ll need to hire a front-end developer on your own.

When comparing Node.js to Golang, it’s evident that Node.js has a lower learning curve.

Community

Open-source projects are notable for the enormous number of developers who contribute on a daily basis, as well as the large community that supports them. Both Nodejs vs Golang are open source projects with large development communities and support.

On the one hand, Node.js is a more developed framework with a larger and more welcoming community. The Node.js Foundation oversees the security and long-term support (LTS) plan for greater Node.js stability, facilitating wider adoption.

GoDaddy, Intel, IBM, Microsoft, PayPal, and NodeSource are among the members of the Node.js Foundation and Node+JS Interactive, where programmers reveal new upgrades and updates to Node.js.

Node.js has 80,300 Github stars and over one billion downloads as of this writing.

Whereas Golang has a smaller but rapidly developing community. Google’s backing for Go and hosting of the GopherCon, an annual gathering of Go developers from around the world to discuss new prospects and changes, provide compelling reasons to switch to Golang.

At the time of writing, Golang had 87,600 Github Stars, which is higher than Node.js, and a big number of contributors from all over the world.

Because Node.js is a JavaScript engine, and JavaScript is more popular, it is evident that it has more community strength than Golang.

Development Tools

Everyone will agree that having libraries and tools available for each work or project saves time and money during development.

When it comes to the number of development tools available, Node.js reigns supreme. In the JavaScript ecosystem, there exist tools for almost any task you can think of, from performing a simple task to accomplishing sophisticated tasks.

NPM alone provides over 800,000 ready-made tools for any circumstance, with many more on the edge of becoming useful.

Golang is a newcomer to the backend development scene, and while it has a lot of helpful capabilities, it doesn’t have as many as Node.js.

 Node.js has more development tools than Golang, owing to the fact that it can be used for both the frontend and the backend, as shown in this comparison.

Salary and Availability of Developers

Because Go is a new language, it can be tough to find developers, but it is one of the most promising, with a bright future ahead of it.

Because of its JavaScript ecosystem, Node.js is already highly popular. For many development projects, it’s considerably easier to find Node.js engineers and expertise.

Let’s take a look at the StackOverflow Survey 2020 for salaries by technology.

Because of the scarcity produced as a new and promising programming language, Golang pays very well:

Golang pays 74,000 USD, compared to 53,000 USD for Node.js. Furthermore, Node.js employment is more plentiful and in great demand than Golang jobs. Because Node.js is a JavaScript engine, job availability for JavaScript is already great, making Node.js extremely profitable.

In the United States, the parallel may also exist.

The comparison shows that Node.js has more engineers and job openings than Golang, yet Golang pays more.

Companies and Apps Using Node.Js

The following is a list of companies and applications that actively use Node.js on their servers.

• Netflix
• LinkedIn
• Walmart
• Trello
• Uber
• PayPal
• Medium
• eBay
• NASA

Companies and Apps Using Golang

The following is a list of companies and applications that actively use Golang on their servers:

• Google
• Uber
• Twitch
• Dailymotion
• SendGrid
• Dropbox
• SoundCloud

Conclusion

It’s difficult to say which technology is superior based on the analysis above. We’ve made an effort to provide you with insights about which technology will best suit your project or align with your company’s culture and processes.

It actually relies on your background when it comes to determining which tool is best.

If you’re a skilled JavaScript programmer, Node.js makes perfect sense. Node is in a language you already know and is part of a large community you’re already a part of! However, there is a potential that you will need to learn a dedicated, high-performance back-end language later on.

If you’re not familiar with JavaScript and want to add a powerful server-side language to your toolkit, Golang is a must-have. It’s young and fresh, but it’s growing every day, and now is an exciting time to join the community and thrive in the employment market, as demand is strong but supply is low.

In any case, Go and Node.js adds significant value to your skillset and allow you to advance in your job.

Hopefully, this article has given you some direction in deciding between Golang and Node.js