React-Native Is Dead... Thanks to AI.

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00:00:00shopify have been huge backers of react native for half a decade but this week they just announced
00:00:05they're going back to native and if you understand why you might want to switch as well the biggest
00:00:10claim of platforms like react native is you can build your app once release it to both android
00:00:15and ios it's just one code base one language and far less maintenance and shopify were all in on
00:00:21this idea they maintain react native packages with apparently over 2 million weekly downloads
00:00:26and as recently as 2025 they published articles renewing their support for the technology but one
00:00:32year on and they've suddenly had a massive change of heart all those open source repos are being
00:00:37abandoned and the company has fully switched back to native the main reason is advancements in ai with
00:00:44the latest models and some smart in-house tech the burden of building two separate apps no longer
00:00:49apply you can just put a model at your ios app and be like yo build me this in android and it works so
00:00:55today we'll go over exactly how shopify are building for native and i'm in complete agreement
00:01:00with them on this despite building in react native myself for a good part of the last decade i've also
00:01:06switched back over to native and i've been pleasantly surprised so hopefully in this video i'll convince
00:01:12you to do the same so shopify last week published an article saying native is now the future of mobile
00:01:23shopify and it's full of absolute gems they talk about preventing ai slop by building a system called
00:01:29helix to break agent work into smaller chunks and how to handle fast feedback loops so agents can test
00:01:36quickly after building with native for the last few months myself it has fundamentally changed my own
00:01:42workflow so let's run through everything but first off why the switch because as they themselves said just
00:01:48in 2025 i wrote that the future of react native was bright and that shopify planned to keep investing
00:01:54in it but since then coding models have gotten dramatically better and for apps and our team
00:01:59building the same feature in swift and kotlin no longer carries the cost it used to so the benefits of
00:02:05react native building once for both platforms no longer apply thanks to ai so first off they built this
00:02:11system called helix to solve the shortfall of current models they said it's tempting to just point an llm to
00:02:17the react native code base and try to one shot the same feature in native but it just doesn't work
00:02:23even if you ask it to gather as much information as it can freeze that up into specs and task files and
00:02:29then implement it you end up with a huge amount of unmaintainable code that can't be shipped helix instead
00:02:34anticipates that the first attempt will not be perfect and builds a loop where an imperfect attempt simply
00:02:41cannot move forward until it becomes a good result a developer first points helix at a screen it reads
00:02:46the react native code proposes a sequence of checkpoints small ordered slices of the work that
00:02:52can be reviewed in minutes then checkpoint by checkpoint it builds each one must prove its behavior with tests
00:03:00match the running app in a visual review survive two adversarial code reviews and get a human's nod
00:03:05before it's committed and the next one starts feedback from each of these reviews is remembered
00:03:11so the loop gets more autonomous as the migration progresses this approach effectively eliminates slop
00:03:18but with all of this in place it's still left a massive problem because compiling and testing for native
00:03:23is slow agents can make changes in seconds but it takes them several minutes to test the output
00:03:29this makes iterating extremely slow and manual it doesn't really matter how good the model is if
00:03:34it can't test its work quickly which is especially difficult on mobile shopify solved this in two
00:03:40specific ways first business logic should be completely decoupled from the ui this means logic can run
00:03:46headlessly on desktop and is available to agents to run via a cli that allows them to iterate in
00:03:52milliseconds instead of minutes by not involving simulators from the context of web development this is like
00:03:58holding all of your app state in json then firing actions to update that json store the ui is just
00:04:04a representation of that state so there's never a need to process the accessibility tree inspect the
00:04:10screen or find and click any elements everything can be driven without the ui at all and in cases
00:04:16where you really do need to render the ui you can still drive all of the interactions from the cli
00:04:22so everything remains fast this is the agent testing an app in real time and this is not sped up at all
00:04:28i've put together a simple demo doing the same which through the cli can pull up youtube and
00:04:32subscribe to better stack but you don't even need an agent to do that you can just subscribe
00:04:36using the button below this video without a setup like this you'd need to use apple's
00:04:41xcu i test but this runs out of process finds elements by walking the accessibility hierarchy
00:04:46synthesizes taps then re-queries the tree to verify which in contrast is super slow and flaky so
00:04:53following these techniques the shop app has already shipped fully native that's an app with 3 million
00:04:59monthly downloads now the caveat here is shopify is of course a massive company you'd still have to
00:05:06maintain two apps yourself but i'd say this is what's possible with models today over the next few
00:05:11months and years this is only going to get easier and i think that does start to erode react native's
00:05:17value even more shopify maintain a few major open source packages including flashlist with 2 million
00:05:23weekly downloads react native skier and restyle all of these packages are now being handed over to
00:05:30third-party maintainers so it seems shopify are entirely wiping their hands with react native
00:05:36airbnb also notably left react native many many years ago because maintaining ios android and a bridge
00:05:43was three platforms not one now i've loved developing in react native for years i spent most of my career
00:05:50in that space but i do think this is the beginning of the end for cross-platform tech as agents improve
00:05:56why would you not want to optimize for performance and better platform native functionality like cloud
00:06:02kit and swift ui of course you could interact with these systems through react native but performance
00:06:08is never going to be as good let me know what you think in the comments subscribe if you haven't already
00:06:13we release tech and ai content constantly and i'll see you next time

Key Takeaway

Shopify abandoned React Native and migrated its 3-million-user Shop app back to native Swift and Kotlin because modern AI models eliminate the cost of maintaining separate codebases.

Highlights

  • Shopify abandoned its React Native open-source libraries—including FlashList, which averages over 2 million weekly downloads—to transition back to native mobile development.

  • Advances in AI coding models eliminate the cost advantage of cross-platform frameworks by letting developers instantly mirror iOS features to Android.

  • Shopify built an internal tool called Helix that converts React Native code into native apps through small, test-backed checkpoints to prevent AI-generated slop.

  • Decoupling business logic from UI allows AI agents to execute tests via a CLI in milliseconds rather than waiting minutes for native mobile simulators to compile.

  • The Shop app, which serves 3 million monthly downloads, shipped entirely in native code using AI-assisted migration strategies.

Timeline

Shopify's Shift from React Native to Native Development

  • Shopify abandoned its React Native open-source packages despite renewing support for the framework as recently as 2025.
  • AI code generation removes the main cost barrier of writing separate codebases for iOS and Android.
  • Major open-source tools maintained by Shopify are transferring to third-party maintainers.

For five years, Shopify heavily backed React Native to maintain a single codebase across platforms. Advances in LLM capabilities changed this calculation by enabling developers to convert Swift code directly into Kotlin automatically. Consequently, Shopify surrendered ownership of major repositories like FlashList, React Native Skia, and Restyle to return to native development.

Preventing AI Slop with the Helix Migration System

  • One-shotting a full React Native code base into native code produces unmaintainable, unshipable slop.
  • Helix breaks feature migrations into small checkpoints that developer agents review in minutes.
  • Every code checkpoint must pass tests, visual inspections, two code reviews, and human approval before committing.

Directly prompting an LLM to rewrite a cross-platform codebase into native code fails due to accumulating errors. Shopify created Helix to force an iterative loop that blocks imperfect code from moving forward. The system reads React Native screens, creates ordered work slices, and validates each step against strict test suites and human review before proceeding.

Accelerating Native Feedback Loops via CLI and Headless Logic

  • Native app compilation and simulator testing create massive bottlenecks for fast AI agent iteration.
  • Decoupling business logic into a headless desktop layer reduces agent test feedback loops from minutes to milliseconds.
  • Driving app state directly via a CLI avoids the slowness and flakiness of Apple's XCUI Test framework.

Traditional mobile UI testing requires walking accessibility trees and simulating user taps, which stalls AI agents. Shopify solved this by separating core app state from UI rendering, treating app state like a JSON store. Agents execute actions directly through a command-line interface without opening heavy mobile simulators, allowing near-instant validation.

The End of Cross-Platform Mobile Frameworks

  • Shopify's fully native Shop app handles over 3 million monthly downloads.
  • Cross-platform bridges introduce performance overhead and limit access to deep platform-native APIs like CloudKit and SwiftUI.
  • Improving AI agents erode the core value proposition of single-codebase tools like React Native.

Airbnb left React Native years ago because managing iOS, Android, and a bridge effectively required maintaining three platforms instead of one. With AI handling the friction of multi-codebase maintenance, developers gain direct access to full platform performance and native APIs without trade-offs. The scale of the Shop app proves that AI-driven native development works for massive production environments.

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