Choosing a State Management Approach

State management is one of those areas where teams often reach for complex solutions before understanding their actual needs. Whether building simple marketing sites or large-scale collaborative tools, the pattern is consistent: teams that start simple and escalate deliberately tend to ship faster and maintain their code more easily than teams that adopt heavyweight solutions from the outset.

The challenge isn’t choosing between specific libraries. The challenge is understanding what kind of state you have and where it should live. Once you understand that, the tooling choices become more straightforward.

Assess Your Situation First

Before selecting a state management approach, consider your context:

• Application complexity: A form with a few inputs has different needs than a real-time collaborative editor. Some teams add centralized state management to applications that would be simpler with local component state, and the overhead never pays off.
• Team size: When multiple developers work on the same codebase, centralized state can prevent conflicts and make data flow easier to trace. For smaller teams, the coordination overhead may not be worth it.
• State characteristics: Different types of state have different lifecycles. Server data that can go stale behaves differently from UI state that resets when a component unmounts.
• Performance requirements: Some approaches trigger more re-renders than others. For most applications this doesn’t matter, but for performance-sensitive interfaces it’s worth considering early.

Understand the Types of State

I find it helpful to categorize state by its source and lifecycle, because different categories benefit from different approaches.

UI state includes whether a dropdown is open, which tab is selected, or what page the user is viewing. This state is ephemeral and typically doesn’t need to travel far from where it’s used.

Form state includes field values, validation errors, and submission status. Forms have specific needs around validation, dirty tracking, and error handling that generic state solutions handle poorly.

Server state is data that originates from an API and is cached locally. It can become stale, needs refetching strategies, and may be modified by other users while you’re viewing it. Treating server state the same as client state is a common source of bugs.

Client state is data your application owns entirely, such as user preferences or draft content that hasn’t been saved. This is the only state that truly belongs in a client-side store.

URL state lives in the address bar and deserves special treatment because it’s shareable and bookmarkable. If users would be frustrated to lose something on page refresh, it probably belongs in the URL.

Evaluate the Core Options

Local Component State

Component State keeps data within a single component using the framework’s built-in primitives. Every modern framework provides this capability, whether through hooks, reactive references, or reactive variables.

Choose local state when:

• Only one component needs the data
• The state resets appropriately when the component unmounts
• You want the simplest possible implementation

Keep it manageable: Local state is the easiest to test and reason about. I recommend defaulting to local state and only moving data elsewhere when you have a specific reason. Moving from local to shared state is straightforward; going the other direction is more difficult.

Lifted State

State Lifting moves state to a common ancestor when multiple components need to share it. The parent holds the state, passes it down as props, and provides callbacks for children to request updates. This pattern works identically across frameworks.

Choose lifted state when:

• Two or more sibling components need the same data
• The shared state has a clear common ancestor
• Prop drilling remains shallow, typically three levels or fewer

Recognize when to lift: If you find yourself duplicating the same state in multiple components or passing callbacks through a parent solely to coordinate siblings, it’s time to lift that state.

Dependency Injection

Every framework provides a mechanism to pass data through multiple component layers without threading it through every intermediate component. React calls this Context, Vue uses provide/inject, Angular has its dependency injection system, and Svelte offers context and stores. The underlying pattern is the same: making data available to descendants without explicit prop passing.

Choose dependency injection when:

• Data is genuinely global: theme, locale, authenticated user
• The data updates infrequently
• Many components throughout the tree need access

Avoid common pitfalls: In most frameworks, injected state triggers re-renders in all consumers when its value changes. Putting frequently-updating state in this layer, such as form inputs or loading indicators, can cause performance problems. Applications can slow down significantly when teams use dependency injection for state that should remain local.

Global State Libraries

Dedicated state management libraries provide infrastructure for managing state across an application. They add coordination capabilities that simpler approaches lack. Examples include Redux, Zustand, MobX, and Jotai in the React ecosystem; Pinia for Vue; NgRx for Angular; and framework-agnostic options like XState or Effector.

Choose a state library when:

• Many disconnected components need the same data
• State updates come from multiple sources and you need to trace data flow
• You need developer tools for debugging complex state transitions
• Multiple developers are modifying the same state and need clear conventions

Evaluate the cost: These libraries add concepts your team must learn, code you must maintain, and abstractions that can obscure simple operations. The coordination benefits are real, but so are the costs. Most applications don’t need them.

Server State Libraries

Specialized libraries for caching and synchronizing data from APIs handle concerns that generic state libraries handle poorly: caching, deduplication, background refetching, and optimistic updates. TanStack Query works across React, Vue, Solid, and Svelte. Apollo Client and urql handle GraphQL. SWR serves React applications. Each framework ecosystem has options.

Choose a server state library when:

• Your application fetches data from APIs
• Multiple components display the same server data
• You need caching, automatic refetching, or optimistic updates

Separate concerns: Server state and client state have different lifecycles and update patterns. Keeping them in separate systems makes both easier to manage. I recommend using a server state library for API data and a simpler approach for everything else.

Form Libraries

Specialized form libraries handle validation, error handling, and submission management. React has React Hook Form and Formik; Vue has VeeValidate and FormKit; Angular has robust built-in form handling; Svelte has Felte and Superforms. These encode best practices that would otherwise require significant effort to implement correctly.

Choose a form library when:

• Forms have many fields or complex validation rules
• Fields have dependencies on each other
• You need async validation or multi-step flows

Start simple: For forms with two or three fields and basic validation, local state works fine. Form libraries become valuable when the complexity justifies their API surface.

Combine Approaches When It Makes Sense

In my experience, most applications benefit from using multiple approaches for different types of state:

• Local state for UI concerns like open/closed toggles and selected tabs
• Lifted state for data shared between a few related components
• Server state library for API data with caching and refetching
• Form library for complex forms with validation
• Dependency injection sparingly, for truly global and infrequently-changing data
• Global state library only when coordination complexity genuinely requires it

This layered approach keeps each type of state in the most appropriate system rather than forcing everything into one solution.

Quick Decision Guide

Signals That Your Approach Needs to Change

Watch for specific symptoms that indicate the current approach has been outgrown:

• Prop drilling through many layers: If props pass through three or more components that don’t use them, consider dependency injection or lifting state higher.
• Duplicated state: If the same conceptual data lives in multiple places and gets out of sync, consolidate it.
• Performance problems from injected state: If updates to injected state cause visible slowdowns, move that state to a more granular solution.
• Multiple injection points becoming unwieldy: If you have four or five separate injection points that interact in complex ways, a dedicated state library may provide clearer structure.
• State transitions with complex rules: If updates require coordinating changes across multiple pieces of state, a reducer or state library can centralize that logic.

The key is responding to actual problems rather than anticipated ones. Escalate when the current approach creates friction you’re experiencing now, not friction you might experience later.

Decision Checklist

Before committing to an approach, work through these questions:

What type of state is this? UI state, form state, server state, or client state each have different characteristics. Match the approach to the type.

How many components need it? One component suggests local state. A few related components suggest lifted state. Many disconnected components suggest dependency injection or a library.

How often does it change? Frequently-updating state performs poorly when injected broadly. Consider more granular solutions for data that changes often.

Does it come from an API? Server data benefits from purpose-built libraries that handle caching, staleness, and refetching.

Can I migrate later? Encapsulate state access behind functions or composables so you can change the underlying implementation without rewriting consumers.

Next steps: Start with the simplest approach that meets your needs. Document your choices so future team members understand the reasoning. Revisit the decision when you encounter friction, and don’t hesitate to change approaches as your application evolves.