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Boosting Performance with Hydration in Angular 18
Exploring the Power of Efficient Hydration in Modern Angular Applications With a small practical example
TL;TR
Hydration in Angular 18 is a technique that improves the performance of Server-Side Rendered (SSR) applications by reusing the server-rendered DOM on the client side, rather than rebuilding it from scratch. This leads to faster load times and a smoother user experience.
What is Hydration?
Hydration restores the server-rendered application on the client side. Instead of recreating DOM elements, Angular matches and reuses the DOM, which speeds up loading and prevents flickering.
This makes your site more interactive and improves metrics like First Input Delay (FID), Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), and Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS).
Why is Hydration Important?
Without hydration, SSR applications will destroy and rebuild the DOM on the client, which causes visual flickers and slower page loads.
Hydration prevents this, reducing unnecessary re-renders and improving Core Web Vitals, which also benefits SEO.
