Modern Full Stack Application Architecture Using Next.js 15+

Wed, 25 Jun 2025 12:33:00 +0000
Architecture, Full stack, React, frameworks, Next.Js

The React library has been popular in the frontend world for many years. It allows developers to build interactive user interfaces with reusable components that can be composed together. This modular approach makes the application scalable and easy to maintain.

As a library, React allows developers to select additional tools, such as routing, state management, data fetching, caching, or page rendering strategies. This flexible approach gives a lot of freedom. Yet, in practice, it boils down to making architectural decisions, such as how to structure folders and files, what naming conventions to adopt, how to secure the application at the SSR level, what approach to take for SEO, or, finally, how to take care of the developer experience. Developers must, therefore, spend time configuring tools and reinventing solutions for typical application requirements.

Introduction

Among frameworks that offer such configuration and tools “out of the box”, Next.js is dominant. Currently, it is the most mature framework and, therefore, a fairly obvious choice, especially for React developers or ones who want to build their applications in the React ecosystem.

Next.js prioritizes server-side rendering (SSR) as its primary rendering technique. It also enables the use of static-site generation (SSG), incremental static regeneration (ISR), and client-side rendering (CSR). In addition, it provides React Server Components (RSC) and React Server Functions (RSF) as basic architectural elements. Moreover, Next.js allows to mix and match these rendering techniques; for example, a landing page can use SSG, while an application with authentication (dashboard) can use SSR.

React itself allows the creation of applications that run only on the client side. So, if the backend is needed for it (for example, for handling database queries, or authentication), it needs to be built separately and integrated with the React application. Next.js, on the other hand, enables the development of full-stack applications. It allows the developer to focus on both the frontend and the backend in one framework.

Key features of Next.js

1. SSR - built-in support for rendering pages on the server, improving performance and SEO

2. SSG - support for static site generation, where pages are generated at compile time and served as static HTML files for faster loading and reduced server load

3. Automatic code splitting - Next.js splits code into smaller and more manageable chunks, optimizing performance and loading time

4. CSS support- support for various CSS solutions including CSS modules, CSS-in-JS libraries, global CSS styles, providing flexibility in application styling

5. Data fetching - support for various methods of fetching data at compile time or at request time

6. Routing - is greatly simplified due to automatic route generation based on file structure and page directories

7. Image optimization - automatic optimization to ensure optimal loading performance by resizing and compressing images

8. Built-in CSS and JavaScript bundling - automatically optimizes and bundles CSS and JS for more efficient loading

9. API proxying - allows to create API routes that can serve as proxies for third-party APIs, supporting fetching data and security

10. Internationalization support - Next.js provides tools and libraries for multi-language support

Considering...