The Digital Press

Vanilla JS is a minimalist, ultra-fast JavaScript framework widely adopted by major tech companies for building high-performance web applications. It boasts a tiny footprint, outperforming many traditional libraries in speed.

Why it matters: Vanilla JS is used on more websites than jQuery, Prototype JS, MooTools, YUI, and Google Web Toolkit combined.

Stunning stat: It executes DOM element retrieval operations over 12 million times per second, vastly outpacing competitors like jQuery.

The big picture: Its zero-byte core (0 uncompressed, 25 bytes gzipped) and automatic browser loading make it exceptionally lightweight and fast.

Commenters say: Many admire its speed and efficiency but criticize the confusing name, noting that "Vanilla JavaScript" traditionally means plain JavaScript without libraries.