2026-07-15 · #36
React Native Weekly #36 React Native 0.87, Gemma 4 On-Device, Callstack Sniffler and more
Uniwnd Hits 1 Million Monthly Downloads#
Uniwnd, a styling library for React Native, has reached 1 million monthly downloads in just about 9 months since its release. Author jpudysz expressed his gratitude to the community.
Uniwind is a big success and has just reached 1M monthly downloads in ~9 months! Thank you all for the support and trust 🥳
React Navigation 8 Updates Since March — A Roundup#
React Navigation 8 has shipped a number of new features since March, including Suspense and Concurrent rendering support, experimental data loaders, and shared paths for deep linking. Screen retention in Stack and typed hooks in dynamic navigators are also included, all summarized in a blog post.
🚀 React Navigation 8 keeps leveling up! Our latest blog post rounds up everything shipped since March: ⚛️ Suspense & concurrent rendering 📡 Experimental data loaders 🔠 Typed hooks in dynamic navigators 🔗 Shared paths for deep links 📌 Retaining screens in Stack 🎨 Material
React Native 0.87 Expected to Be a Major Cleanup Release#
React Native 0.87 is set to remove a large number of deprecated APIs, including InteractionManager and SafeAreaView, making the path toward version 1.0 much clearer. Both JS-side and native deprecated APIs are on the chopping block.
👀 React Native 0.87 looks like a big cleanup release Lots of deprecated APIs are being removed, JS + native This includes significant ones: InteractionManager, SafeAreaView... Also, more APIs are getting deprecated, scheduled to be removed later Clearly moving toward 1.0 👀
Gemma 4 Now Runs On-Device with React Native#
Google’s Gemma 4 can now run on-device using React Native. It leverages local hardware acceleration — the Vulkan delegate on Android and the MLX delegate on Apple Silicon — enabling fully offline vision and tool-use capabilities in cross-platform apps.
Gemma 4 now works on-device using React Native! You can now run Gemma 4 fully offline in your cross-platform apps with local hardware acceleration: ⚡ Vulkan delegate on Android ⚡ MLX delegate on Apple Silicon See Gemma 4's vision and tool-use capabilities in action, instantly
Emoji Picker “rn-expo-emoji-picker” Released#
A new emoji picker for the New Architecture, rn-expo-emoji-picker, has been published to npm. Benchmarks show zero blank cells while fast-scrolling through 1,900+ emoji in DEV mode on a 4-year-old Android device. It supports swappable rendering engines: FlashList v2, LegendList, and FlatList.
it's live 🚀 npm i rn-expo-emoji-picker emoji picker for react native's new architecture — with an optional native row renderer that draws each row as a single native view. that's what you're seeing in the video. • Swappable engines: FlashList v2 / LegendList / FlatList • twitter.com/Jassi22G_/status/2…
An emoji picker for React Native that draws each row as ONE native view. Left: JS rows. Right: native rows (CoreText / Canvas). This is a 4-year-old Android. In DEV mode. Max-speed flings over 1,900+ emoji. Zero blank cells. Not one. New Architecture only. Dropping soon 👀
First Successful Clean Prebuild for Windows with Expo Desktop#
birch_js has become the first to successfully delete all ios, android, macos, and windows folders and regenerate them from prebuild templates using Expo Desktop. A config plugin that correctly handles React Native Windows files has also been implemented, bringing CNG for Windows one step closer to reality.
Just did my first successful clean prebuild with Expo Desktop (up until now, I've been limited to dirty prebuilds). It successfully deleted the ios, android, macos, and windows folders and regenerated them all from my prebuild template 🚀
I've now implemented config plugins so that Expo Desktop Prebuild correctly handles the following React Native Windows files: App.sln App/MyApp.vcxproj App.Package/Package.appxmanifest App.Package/App.Package.wapproj Still more to go, but getting closer to CNG for Windows! 🐢
Callstack Announces E2E Test Optimization Tool “Sniffler”#
Sniffler, announced by Callstack, traces import/export relationships across an entire codebase starting from changed files, and identifies only the E2E tests that are actually affected. It’s designed to eliminate the need for full-suite runs in large E2E test suites.
We’re introducing Sniffler, a tool for JS and TS teams with large E2E suites. It takes changed files, traces import/export relationships across the codebase, and identifies the E2E tests those changes can affect. The goal is simple: stop defaulting to full-suite runs when the
Software Mansion Announces “Argent Lens” — a UI Design Review Tool for AI Agents#
Software Mansion has released Argent Lens as an experimental feature. AI agents propose multiple design variants, and users can leave comments on any part of the UI and apply changes directly.
Introducing: Argent Lens 🔍 A design review tool for agent-generated UI. With Lens your AI-agent can propose several design variants. You pick the one you like, leave comments on any part of the UI, and apply the changes. Now available in experimental.
One More Thing#
The “zero blank cells in DEV mode on a 4-year-old Android device” stat from rn-expo-emoji-picker really stuck with me. It’s rare to see a library that takes emoji picker scroll performance this seriously!