Hello, humble bumble dev 👋!
Today we're going to explore something massive, both literally and figuratively: data tables with 1 million rows.
Yep, that's right. We're not talking about a handful of to-do items or a polite little contacts list. We're talking MILLIONS of rows, real-world, backend-fed, browser-rendered big boy data.
And today, we're putting two contenders to the test:
- 🥊 TanStack Table, the battle-tested React data table library.
- 🥊 Table RS, the new WASM godly-powered table built with Rust + Yew.
You might think, "Wait... a WASM table? How different could it really be?". Oh, just hold my cargo build. Because what you're about to see is not just a difference, it's a generational leap.
Let's break it down, with real numbers, a little bit of sass, and a whole lot of truth.
⚔️ The Competitors: React vs WASM
🟨 TanStack Table (React)
TanStack Table is a beloved data-table library in the React ecosystem. Works great in many apps. Strong community. Solid virtualized rendering support. But... it still lives and breathes JavaScript. And JavaScript, dear friends, struggles when things get huge.
🟩 Table RS (Yew + WASM)
A newcomer, built in Rust, compiled to WASM, running in the browser with near-native performance. No virtual DOM. No garbage collection. Just pure speed, stability, and zero apologies.
📊 Benchmark: TanStack Table vs Table RS (1 Million Rows)
| Metric | TanStack Table (React) | Table RS (Yew + WASM) |
|---|---|---|
| Page Load Time (1M rows) | ~10 seconds | ~2 seconds |
| Memory Heap Usage | >3 GB (heap overflow!) | ~1.1 GB |
| Initial Rendering | Heavy blocking, slow DOM paint | Efficient, lightweight rendering |
| Browser Responsiveness | Laggy and delayed | Smooth like butter |
| Sorting Performance | 2-4s for large columns | Sub-1s 💨 |
| Search Performance | Acceptable, but sluggish | Instant. Blink-and-it's-done |
| Lighthouse Performance Score | 49/100 | 60/100 (with 1M rows!) |
| Scalability | Hits JS memory limits fast | Laughs in WebAssembly |
Let's be real: that's not even close. And if you're thinking "wait, maybe TanStack just needs some optimization", let me gently stop you right there...
🧠 Why TanStack Falls Apart
TanStack Table is amazing for normal data sets. But 1 million rows is where JavaScript's weaknesses explode:
- Memory consumption spikes to 3GB+ just to load data.
- Sorting or filtering starts to choke the main thread.
- React's reconciliation starts gasping for air.
- Eventually: 💥 heap overflow errors.
You might even get browser crashes depending on the system. It's not TanStack's fault. It's the platform.
🦾 Why Table RS Rocks So Hard
Table RS doesn't play around. It:
- Loads 1 million rows with ~1GB memory.
- Sorts and filters in milliseconds.
- Doesn't need hydration.
- Doesn't virtualize, it just renders what's needed, fast.
- Compiles from Rust to Wasm = native god-like binary performance in your browser.
No garbage collection. No memory leaks. No jank. It's like putting a Formula 1 engine into your HTML table.
🚀 Real-World Experience
When testing both, here's what we saw:
- TanStack Table: 10+ second initial load. Browser lags. Dev tools freeze. Heap overflow during build when enabling aggressive queries.
- Table RS: Loads in 2 seconds flat. Page remains responsive. Sorts in less than 1s. Feels native.
Even Lighthouse agrees:
| Metric | TanStack (React) | Table RS (WASM) |
|---|---|---|
| Performance Score | 49/100 | 60/100 |
| Memory Stability | ❌ | ✅ |
| First Contentful Paint | 4-5s | ~1.1s |
| CPU Blocking Time | 🧱 Huge | 😌 Minimal |
Remember, that's with 1 million rows. Not 10. Not 100. A literal million.
🔥 Why WebAssembly Is the Future
Let's put this simply:
- JavaScript is fine for interactive toys and CRUD apps.
- But when you need to go beyond the limits of the VDOM, you need WASM.
- Rust + Wasm compiles to tiny, fast, deterministic code.
- It's not just fast, it's reliable, predictable, and insanely scalable.
WASM doesn't guess. It doesn't garbage collect. It just runs.
React and JS frameworks are incredible for most apps, but they hit the ceiling fast when you're dealing with real data at scale.
📣 Final Verdict
| Category | Winner |
|---|---|
| Memory Efficiency | Table RS |
| Rendering Speed | Table RS |
| Browser Stability | Table RS |
| Sorting/Filtering | Table RS |
| Lighthouse Score | Table RS |
| Developer Vibes 😎 | Table RS |
✅ If you're building a real-world, data-heavy frontend, and you care about:
- Speed.
- Memory.
- Reliability.
- And not making your users cry.
Then Table RS with Yew + WASM isn't just a cool idea. It's the clear future of frontend performance.
👋 Wrap-Up: JS Had a Good Run...
But it's time.
The web is moving toward compiled, typed, high-performance apps. And WASM is the rocket fuel that's going to power it. Rust + WASM let you build massive-scale web apps with tiny, reliable performance footprints. That's not just good engineering. That's ethical development. You're saving your users from slow pages and broken tabs.
📋 Table RS
🎬 Demo
| Framework | Live Demo |
|---|---|
| Yew | |
| Dioxus | TODO |
| Leptos | TODO |
📜 Intro
Table RS is a powerful, lightweight, and accessible data table component designed specifically for WASM frontends like Yew, Dioxus, and Leptos. It supports sorting, pagination, searching (with URL sync), and is highly customizable via props.
🤔 Why Use Table RS?
The following are some of the reasons why Table RS should be your go-to table component:
- 🔍 Built-in Search: Real-time filtering with URL query parameter synchronization.
- 🧹 Debounced Inputs: Smooth user experience while searching.
-
⬆️ Sorting Support: Column-based sorting with accessible
aria-sortattributes. - 📄 Pagination: Built-in pagination controls for large datasets.
- 🎨 Custom Styling: Easily customize classes and styles.
- 🧩 Accessibility First: Semantic roles and ARIA attributes out of the box.
Yew Usage
Refer to our guide to integrate this component into your Yew…
We are Open SASS, babe!.
We're working tirelessly on making Rust web development extremely easy for everyone.
If you made it this far, it would be nice if you could join us on Discord.
Together, let's move the web beyond JavaScript, and into something that actually compiles.
Feel free to share this. Fork it. Turn it into a meme. Tattoo it on your CI pipeline. Tell your manager Rust is your spirit animal now.
Till next time 👋
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