Go Full Stack Server-Side Rendering vs SPAs - Fernando J. Villamarin Diaz, JPMC

Server-side rendering (SSR) can provide significant performance benefits compared to Single Page Applications (SPAs), with potential 10x reduction in latency

Full-stack approach allows developers to choose where on the spectrum between client-side and server-side rendering they want to land, rather than being locked into pure client-side rendering

Using HTML templating (like Go’s Templ) with HTMX enables interactive features while maintaining the benefits of server-side rendering

Component islands architecture allows caching static content while having dynamic islands of interactivity where needed

CDNs can significantly improve performance by caching static content closer to users

Server-side rendering can result in smaller payload sizes compared to SPAs (43KB vs 54KB in the example)

SSR provides better SEO capabilities since content is directly available in the HTML

The latency overhead of SSR vs SPA was only 1.8% slower in testing, while providing better initial page load times

Breaking applications into clear layers (storage, business logic, API) remains important even with SSR architecture

Modern SSR frameworks allow easy conversion from JavaScript/React components to server-rendered templates while maintaining interactivity