Why I’m Using SvelteKit Instead of Next.js for My Small Side Projects

React + Next.js has almost become the default choice for modern web apps.

And I get why.

The ecosystem is huge. The community is massive. There are countless libraries, templates, examples, and production references. If you are building a large-scale product with a team, complex requirements, and long-term hiring concerns, React + Next.js is still a very safe and powerful choice.

But recently, I’ve been building several small side projects, and I found myself reaching for a different stack:

Svelte + SvelteKit.

Not because I think it is better in every situation.

But because for the kind of products I’m building right now, it feels more direct, more intuitive, and honestly more enjoyable.

Most of my recent side projects are small web apps.

They don’t have hundreds of pages.
They don’t need a large engineering team.
They don’t require a huge architecture from day one.

They are closer to small creative products: simple ideas, focused interactions, lightweight experiences, and quick iterations.

For this kind of work, SvelteKit feels like a very good fit.

With React and Next.js, I often feel like I’m assembling a system. I need to think about component structure, hooks, state management patterns, rendering behavior, dependencies, and framework conventions. Of course, this can be powerful. But for small products, it can also feel like a lot of machinery before the product even becomes real.

With Svelte, the mental model feels simpler to me.

A component looks close to HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
State feels built into the language instead of something I need to organize around a pattern.
Reactivity feels natural.
The amount of boilerplate stays low.

That matters a lot when I’m building with AI-assisted coding, or what people now call “vibe coding.”

When I have an idea, I want to move quickly from concept to working prototype. I want to test the feeling of the product as soon as possible. I want to adjust UI, animation, interaction, and copy without getting slowed down by too much framework ceremony.

SvelteKit works very well for that.

It gives me enough structure to build and deploy a real web app, but it doesn’t make a small project feel bigger than it needs to be.

That balance is important.

For a small side project, speed is not only about writing code faster. It is also about keeping the idea alive. The longer the distance between “I have an idea” and “I shipped something,” the easier it is to lose energy.

SvelteKit helps me keep that distance short.

Another thing I like is how readable the code remains. When I come back to a project after a few days or weeks, I can usually understand what is happening quickly. The UI, state, and behavior are often in the same place in a way that feels easy to scan.

This is especially useful for solo builders.

When you are building alone, you are not just the developer. You are also the designer, product manager, QA, marketer, and support person. Anything that reduces cognitive load helps.

React + Next.js is still great. I’m not trying to say one stack is universally better than the other.

But I do think more indie builders should consider whether they really need the default mainstream stack for every small idea.

For large products, React + Next.js may still be the safer choice.

For small, focused, creative web apps, Svelte + SvelteKit can feel surprisingly productive.

At least for me, it has become one of the best stacks for turning small ideas into shipped products.

The harder part now is not building.

It is distribution.

I’ve shipped several small projects, but traffic does not magically appear just because the product exists. That’s the next thing I’m learning: how to bring people to the things I build.

Here are the recent small products I built with SvelteKit:

🍀 Fortune Today
A small daily fortune app
https://fortunetoday.app/

🕹️ Retro Watch
A retro pixel clock for your browser
https://retrowatch.app/

🫧 Fidgetivity
A tiny browser-based fidget experience
https://fidgetivity.com/

I’m still learning how to get traffic, how to distribute small products, and how to make these projects discoverable.

But at least on the building side, SvelteKit has made the process feel lighter, faster, and more fun.