Backbone.js vs. Preact vs. React vs. jQuery Mobile Comparison Chart

Preact provides the thinnest possible Virtual DOM abstraction on top of the DOM. It builds on stable platform features, registers real event handlers and plays nicely with other libraries. Most UI frameworks are large enough to be the majority of an app's JavaScript size. Preact is different: it's small enough that your code is the largest part of your application. That means less JavaScript to download, parse and execute - leaving more time for your code, so you can build an experience you define without fighting to keep a framework under control. Preact is fast, and not just because of its size. It's one of the fastest Virtual DOM libraries out there, thanks to a simple and predictable diff implementation. We automatically batch updates and tune Preact to the extreme when it comes to performance. We work closely with browser engineers to get the maximum performance possible out of Preact.

jQuery Mobile is an HTML5-based user interface system designed to make responsive websites and apps that are accessible on all smartphones, tablets, and desktop devices. jQuery Mobile framework takes the "write less, do more" mantra to the next level: Instead of writing unique applications for each mobile device or OS, the jQuery mobile framework allows you to design a single highly-branded responsive website or application that will work on all popular smartphone, tablet, and desktop platforms. We believe that your website or app should feel like your brand, not any particular OS. To make building highly customized themes easy, we've created ThemeRoller for mobile to make it easy to drag and drop colors and download a custom theme. For polished visuals without the bloat, we leverage CSS3 properties. We recommend using our tool to build a custom bundle that contains only the components you need.