{"slug": "ruby-on-rails", "name": "Ruby on Rails", "category": "dev-libs", "category_name": "Libraries and frameworks", "description": "Full-stack, server-side web application framework for Ruby built around convention over configuration.", "recommenders": 29, "commenters": 49, "warners": 1, "score": 29.291, "rising": -0.2, "first": "2025-12-01", "latest": "2026-10-21", "why": "HN commenters like Rails for batteries-included productivity on CRUD and SaaS web apps, especially for solo developers and early-stage products, and for its mature conventions and large ecosystem.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 29, "neutral": 19, "compare": 4, "warn": 1}, "spark": [0, 4, 3, 2, 5, 0, 2, 3, 2, 3, 4, 1], "listed": true, "loved": ["Productivity", "CRUD web apps"], "caveat": "Non-standard requirements", "short_quote": "I've been a Rails DevOps and nowadays a web one-man-show with it for over 10 years and I'd do it again.", "icon": true, "domain": null, "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://rubyonrails.org", "pricing": "open source", "aliases": ["Ruby on Rails", "Rails"], "verdict": [{"text": "HN commenters like Rails for batteries-included productivity on CRUD and SaaS web apps", "cites": [{"id": 797570320, "item_id": 49848145, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49848145", "by": "dysoco", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "something as batteries-included and expressive like Rails or Django", "excerpt": "But they fill different niches, there's no way I'm going to choose Rust+Axum as much as I love Rust for an ecommerce/CRUD vs something as batteries-included and expressive like Rails or Django.", "context": "", "use_case": "ecommerce/CRUD apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "What About Rails?"}, {"id": 757584864, "item_id": 47349054, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47349054", "by": "dzonga", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Rails for straight up CRUD is top, autogenerated things etc", "excerpt": "Rails for straight up CRUD is top, autogenerated things etc however if your app doesn't fit the standard crud pattern you end just fiddling with a lot of things that you shouldn't and in that case I recommend Django which provides enough flexibility while providing a good base. There's less magic in Django", "context": "", "use_case": "CRUD apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 772646608, "item_id": 48290413, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48290413", "by": "ramon156", "date": "2026-05-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "RoR is.. \"good enough\".", "excerpt": "Hey I'm in the same boat! I love Go and Rust, they're wonderful languages with their own ups and downs. Sadly I never was able to build a SaaS app with either. Something about a square peg and a round hole... I could be very wrong, but there's a lot of gadgets that come with a SaaS tool, and I'm not inventing them. RoR is.. \"good enough\". I can opt-in types whenever, I can build things quick, the tooling is alright, ", "context": "building SaaS apps", "use_case": "building SaaS apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "From Rust to Ruby"}, {"id": 787109490, "item_id": 49194343, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49194343", "by": "0x4d4c", "date": "2026-08-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Since them I'm on Rails.", "excerpt": "I remember, when I used it for the very first time in commercial project. Client briefed me in the afternoon, the next day, before the noon, she got ugly app, but with fully working admin backend. She was sold. But I also remember, that some non-standard requirements were really difficult to implement or get around. Having that in mind, the next project was entirely in Pylons. All was good, until we were asked to add", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "Pylons", "story": "What I love about Django"}]}, {"text": ", especially for solo developers and early-stage products", "cites": [{"id": 770510512, "item_id": 48156907, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48156907", "by": "faangguyindia", "date": "2026-05-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "For solo devs, Rails is arguably most productive webapp system.", "excerpt": "Who even uses Erlang? I used Rails and then i tried Phoenix and it was lot more difficult to get things done. I don't understand Phoenix hype For solo devs, Rails is arguably most productive webapp system. LLM is very good at writing ruby rails code. Much better than writing django in my experience even though python training corpus is huge. I write my experimental apps in Rail when it stabilizes, i do a Go rewrite. ", "context": "solo dev", "use_case": "building web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Erlang/OTP 29.0"}, {"id": 757564288, "item_id": 47347768, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47347768", "by": "louiskottmann", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been a Rails DevOps and nowadays a web one-man-show with it for over 10 years and I'd do it again.", "excerpt": "I've been a Rails DevOps and nowadays a web one-man-show with it for over 10 years and I'd do it again. Not many frameworks have been thriving that long, and there's good reason. It packs everything, is tidy and productive, with a pleasant language to read and write. In the latest Stackoverflow survey, it's back at the \"top 5 of desired stacks to use for next project\" over a decade after its inception ! Give it a try", "context": "Rails DevOps, one-man web shop for 10+ years", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 797446608, "item_id": 49840413, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49840413", "by": "db48x", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Ruby and Rails both go out of their way to provide the developer with as much power as they can.", "excerpt": "I agree with him. All software should be written in safe languages, but there is a wide selection available. For new projects you should pick a language that does as much for you as possible. Ruby and Rails both go out of their way to provide the developer with as much power as they can. They make development less expensive. That\u2019s exactly what you want when you are first building something, before you know exactly w", "context": "", "use_case": "early-stage web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rails World 2026 Opening Keynote [video]"}]}, {"text": ", and for its mature conventions and large ecosystem.", "cites": [{"id": 781747216, "item_id": 48859201, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48859201", "by": "throwatdem12311", "date": "2026-07-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "the reason we use Rails is pretty simple\u2026it\u2019s great, it\u2019s battle tested and has a massive ecosystem.", "excerpt": "We work with Rails but there is more to programming (and Ruby) than work. Sinatra micro services were a thing for a while. Hanami is decent. But the reason we use Rails is pretty simple\u2026it\u2019s great, it\u2019s battle tested and has a massive ecosystem. I don\u2019t even care that DHH is a Nazi because you know what I can use it for non-Nazi stuff and there\u2019s nothing he can do about it. I get his labour for free. He\u2019s like my lit", "context": "works with Rails at work", "use_case": "work web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "How to Start a Ruby Meetup"}, {"id": 742005968, "item_id": 46375373, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46375373", "by": "anon5739483", "date": "2025-12-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is why I use Ruby on Rails. Shared constraints and boring conventions age better than clever mini-frameworks", "excerpt": "This is why I use Ruby on Rails. Shared constraints and boring conventions age better than clever mini-frameworks built around one team's mental model.", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Avoid Mini-Frameworks"}, {"id": 752985600, "item_id": 47061600, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47061600", "by": "aristofun", "date": "2026-02-18", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "only Ruby on Rails world seems to systematically care about devx and infra friction", "excerpt": "Unfortunately only Ruby on Rails world seems to systematically care about devx and infra friction. Others just got used to throwing more money and people on it.", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tell HN: We analyzed our dev time.80% is still infrastructure'setup',notfeatures"}]}, {"text": " The most common caveats are friction once an app strays from standard CRUD patterns", "cites": [{"id": 757584864, "item_id": 47349054, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47349054", "by": "dzonga", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Rails for straight up CRUD is top, autogenerated things etc", "excerpt": "Rails for straight up CRUD is top, autogenerated things etc however if your app doesn't fit the standard crud pattern you end just fiddling with a lot of things that you shouldn't and in that case I recommend Django which provides enough flexibility while providing a good base. There's less magic in Django", "context": "", "use_case": "CRUD apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 787109490, "item_id": 49194343, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49194343", "by": "0x4d4c", "date": "2026-08-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Since them I'm on Rails.", "excerpt": "I remember, when I used it for the very first time in commercial project. Client briefed me in the afternoon, the next day, before the noon, she got ugly app, but with fully working admin backend. She was sold. But I also remember, that some non-standard requirements were really difficult to implement or get around. Having that in mind, the next project was entirely in Pylons. All was good, until we were asked to add", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "Pylons", "story": "What I love about Django"}, {"id": 780345346, "item_id": 48771584, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48771584", "by": "rahil627", "date": "2026-07-02", "stance": "compare", "quote": "implicit object function magicks (rails)", "excerpt": "wow, ai told me this was for enterprise-size apps, \"symfony of the ruby world\" (dependency injection, data mapping..), to which i nearly puked, and avoided since.. it's really interesting to see people try to design things in a clearer way (explicit, modular, functional/immutable, less cpu indirection/execution, etc.) in ruby. I'm new to this language, but i think it's cool that for one big framework go all in on the", "context": "new to Ruby", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Hanami 3.0: In Full Bloom"}]}, {"text": " and the lack of static typing in large codebases.", "cites": [{"id": 757596144, "item_id": 47349759, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47349759", "by": "sensanaty", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "compare", "quote": "I love Rails, but after working for a few places with huge Rails codebases and then several other places with .NET and other frameworks with actual typing, I just can't go back to Rails", "excerpt": "I love Rails, but after working for a few places with huge Rails codebases and then several other places with .NET and other frameworks with actual typing, I just can't go back to Rails for anything that isn't a personal project. Working with a large codebase with an untyped codebase is just a nightmare, even with powerful IDEs like RubyMine that are able to cover some of the paint points. I wonder how good Sorbet is", "context": "worked at places with large Rails and .NET codebases", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 757773121, "item_id": 47360820, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47360820", "by": "liamgriffiths", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I would happily work on a Rails system today too.", "excerpt": "To all the folks in here that bemoan the lack of static types, I'd like to mention there are some great solutions in this space, eg. https://sorbet.org/ Having the productivity of Ruby + the static typing and LSP integrations is a wonderful combination. Sure, it might be less aesthetic than some might like, but at least in my experience, it works very well in practice and supports most of the needs I have from a type", "context": "", "use_case": "web framework", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Productivity", "summary": "Commenters say batteries-included Rails lets them build and ship quickly.", "quotes": [{"id": 797446608, "item_id": 49840413, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49840413", "by": "db48x", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Ruby and Rails both go out of their way to provide the developer with as much power as they can.", "excerpt": "I agree with him. All software should be written in safe languages, but there is a wide selection available. For new projects you should pick a language that does as much for you as possible. Ruby and Rails both go out of their way to provide the developer with as much power as they can. They make development less expensive. That\u2019s exactly what you want when you are first building something, before you know exactly w", "context": "", "use_case": "early-stage web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rails World 2026 Opening Keynote [video]"}, {"id": 770510512, "item_id": 48156907, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48156907", "by": "faangguyindia", "date": "2026-05-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "For solo devs, Rails is arguably most productive webapp system.", "excerpt": "Who even uses Erlang? I used Rails and then i tried Phoenix and it was lot more difficult to get things done. I don't understand Phoenix hype For solo devs, Rails is arguably most productive webapp system. LLM is very good at writing ruby rails code. Much better than writing django in my experience even though python training corpus is huge. I write my experimental apps in Rail when it stabilizes, i do a Go rewrite. ", "context": "solo dev", "use_case": "building web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Erlang/OTP 29.0"}, {"id": 787109490, "item_id": 49194343, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49194343", "by": "0x4d4c", "date": "2026-08-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Since them I'm on Rails.", "excerpt": "I remember, when I used it for the very first time in commercial project. Client briefed me in the afternoon, the next day, before the noon, she got ugly app, but with fully working admin backend. She was sold. But I also remember, that some non-standard requirements were really difficult to implement or get around. Having that in mind, the next project was entirely in Pylons. All was good, until we were asked to add", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "Pylons", "story": "What I love about Django"}]}, {"label": "CRUD web apps", "summary": "Seen as a top choice for CRUD and server-rendered web apps over SPAs.", "quotes": [{"id": 757584864, "item_id": 47349054, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47349054", "by": "dzonga", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Rails for straight up CRUD is top, autogenerated things etc", "excerpt": "Rails for straight up CRUD is top, autogenerated things etc however if your app doesn't fit the standard crud pattern you end just fiddling with a lot of things that you shouldn't and in that case I recommend Django which provides enough flexibility while providing a good base. There's less magic in Django", "context": "", "use_case": "CRUD apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 797570320, "item_id": 49848145, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49848145", "by": "dysoco", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "something as batteries-included and expressive like Rails or Django", "excerpt": "But they fill different niches, there's no way I'm going to choose Rust+Axum as much as I love Rust for an ecommerce/CRUD vs something as batteries-included and expressive like Rails or Django.", "context": "", "use_case": "ecommerce/CRUD apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "What About Rails?"}, {"id": 775684545, "item_id": 48480284, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48480284", "by": "kstrauser", "date": "2026-06-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "90% of the SPAs I use could be Django/Rails/Flask apps with no noticeable difference", "excerpt": "90% of the SPAs I use could be Django/Rails/Flask apps with no noticeable difference, other than that they'd be many times more responsive on slower devices. \"Old\" SSR apps are mature, not obsolete. It's ridiculous when they're not considered even when they'd be the right tool for the job. I wouldn't try to clone Google Docs in Django, but something like Linear could 100% be modeled as a CRUD app with new page loads ", "context": "", "use_case": "server-rendered web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Building an HTML-first site doubled our users overnight"}]}, {"label": "Mature ecosystem", "summary": "Praised as battle-tested, with a massive ecosystem and shared conventions that age well.", "quotes": [{"id": 781747216, "item_id": 48859201, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48859201", "by": "throwatdem12311", "date": "2026-07-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "the reason we use Rails is pretty simple\u2026it\u2019s great, it\u2019s battle tested and has a massive ecosystem.", "excerpt": "We work with Rails but there is more to programming (and Ruby) than work. Sinatra micro services were a thing for a while. Hanami is decent. But the reason we use Rails is pretty simple\u2026it\u2019s great, it\u2019s battle tested and has a massive ecosystem. I don\u2019t even care that DHH is a Nazi because you know what I can use it for non-Nazi stuff and there\u2019s nothing he can do about it. I get his labour for free. He\u2019s like my lit", "context": "works with Rails at work", "use_case": "work web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "How to Start a Ruby Meetup"}, {"id": 742005968, "item_id": 46375373, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46375373", "by": "anon5739483", "date": "2025-12-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is why I use Ruby on Rails. Shared constraints and boring conventions age better than clever mini-frameworks", "excerpt": "This is why I use Ruby on Rails. Shared constraints and boring conventions age better than clever mini-frameworks built around one team's mental model.", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Avoid Mini-Frameworks"}, {"id": 757564288, "item_id": 47347768, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47347768", "by": "louiskottmann", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been a Rails DevOps and nowadays a web one-man-show with it for over 10 years and I'd do it again.", "excerpt": "I've been a Rails DevOps and nowadays a web one-man-show with it for over 10 years and I'd do it again. Not many frameworks have been thriving that long, and there's good reason. It packs everything, is tidy and productive, with a pleasant language to read and write. In the latest Stackoverflow survey, it's back at the \"top 5 of desired stacks to use for next project\" over a decade after its inception ! Give it a try", "context": "Rails DevOps, one-man web shop for 10+ years", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}]}, {"label": "Pleasant code", "summary": "Users enjoy writing Ruby with Rails and value its focus on beautiful, simple code.", "quotes": [{"id": 741519409, "item_id": 46344963, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46344963", "by": "kshahkshah", "date": "2025-12-21", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It\u2019s been a real pleasure getting back into Ruby after so many years in typescript, python, and rust.", "excerpt": "I used cursor over the past three weeks to update a 12 year-old Ruby on rails project. While it has been slightly updated throughout the years, this was my first proper modernization of the code base. It\u2019s been a real pleasure getting back into Ruby after so many years in typescript, python, and rust. Happy to see the update. Real shame about the haters here, the Ruby community is a supportive and positive bunch that", "context": "", "use_case": "web application", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ruby website redesigned"}, {"id": 757558544, "item_id": 47347409, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47347409", "by": "shafyy", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I have been using Rails for over a decade now and always liked the focus on writing beautiful and simple code.", "excerpt": "The main line on the Rails website now reads: > Accelerate your agents with convention over configuration. Ruby on Rails scales from PROMPT to IPO. Token-efficient code that's easy for agents to write and beautiful for humans to review And I fucking hate it. If I read this the first time I would think this is some kind of tool to optimize your LLM agents. I have been using Rails for over a decade now and always liked", "context": "Rails user for over a decade", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 741145953, "item_id": 46321622, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46321622", "by": "elif", "date": "2025-12-18", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "the beautiful code family we used to have with Rails and Django", "excerpt": "I always thought the GWT->react branch of the webdev family tree was an inbred, unecessarily cumbersome compromise bred from JavaScript and performance metrics rather than descending from the beautiful code family we used to have with Rails and Django. The only reason react seems to look beautiful is because it's compared to custom JavaScript state management rather than the server-state paradigm that probably makes ", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Please just try HTMX"}]}, {"label": "Works with LLMs", "summary": "Some find AI agents write Rails code well and can use the built-in console.", "quotes": [{"id": 770510512, "item_id": 48156907, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48156907", "by": "faangguyindia", "date": "2026-05-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "For solo devs, Rails is arguably most productive webapp system.", "excerpt": "Who even uses Erlang? I used Rails and then i tried Phoenix and it was lot more difficult to get things done. I don't understand Phoenix hype For solo devs, Rails is arguably most productive webapp system. LLM is very good at writing ruby rails code. Much better than writing django in my experience even though python training corpus is huge. I write my experimental apps in Rail when it stabilizes, i do a Go rewrite. ", "context": "solo dev", "use_case": "building web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Erlang/OTP 29.0"}, {"id": 797420416, "item_id": 49838776, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49838776", "by": "status_quo69", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Rails dev here, still using it, still plan on using it, use agents", "excerpt": "Rails dev here, still using it, still plan on using it, use agents, don't see them making food gun decisions with rails apis just code. Rails comes with the console by default, so production inspection of a bug is something the ai can do without a ton of bs to be set up, and that console can be forced to be auditable (using standard gems) or read only (using flags). I used to love rust, still do sorta, but yeah I thi", "context": "Rails developer", "use_case": "web development with agents", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rails World 2026 Opening Keynote [video]"}, {"id": 774636256, "item_id": 48414766, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48414766", "by": "estebarb", "date": "2026-06-05", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Simply Ruby on Rails.", "excerpt": "Simply Ruby on Rails. I maintain 3 markdown documents with system design, implementation plan and use cases in repo. Then tell it those files exist and go implement X feature (from implementation plan). These documents, plus AGENTS.md, declare completion criteria, which includes full code coverage both with system and controller tests. Usually I don't tell it to implement something adhoc, I first implement it in the ", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM-assisted app development", "switched_from": "", "story": "DeepSeek reasonix, engineered for low token cost during long running sessions"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Non-standard requirements", "summary": "Apps that don't fit the standard CRUD pattern or need unusual features can be hard to build, and the implicit 'magic' can get in the way.", "quotes": [{"id": 757584864, "item_id": 47349054, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47349054", "by": "dzonga", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Rails for straight up CRUD is top, autogenerated things etc", "excerpt": "Rails for straight up CRUD is top, autogenerated things etc however if your app doesn't fit the standard crud pattern you end just fiddling with a lot of things that you shouldn't and in that case I recommend Django which provides enough flexibility while providing a good base. There's less magic in Django", "context": "", "use_case": "CRUD apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 787109490, "item_id": 49194343, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49194343", "by": "0x4d4c", "date": "2026-08-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Since them I'm on Rails.", "excerpt": "I remember, when I used it for the very first time in commercial project. Client briefed me in the afternoon, the next day, before the noon, she got ugly app, but with fully working admin backend. She was sold. But I also remember, that some non-standard requirements were really difficult to implement or get around. Having that in mind, the next project was entirely in Pylons. All was good, until we were asked to add", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "Pylons", "story": "What I love about Django"}, {"id": 780345346, "item_id": 48771584, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48771584", "by": "rahil627", "date": "2026-07-02", "stance": "compare", "quote": "implicit object function magicks (rails)", "excerpt": "wow, ai told me this was for enterprise-size apps, \"symfony of the ruby world\" (dependency injection, data mapping..), to which i nearly puked, and avoided since.. it's really interesting to see people try to design things in a clearer way (explicit, modular, functional/immutable, less cpu indirection/execution, etc.) in ruby. I'm new to this language, but i think it's cool that for one big framework go all in on the", "context": "new to Ruby", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Hanami 3.0: In Full Bloom"}]}, {"label": "No static typing", "summary": "Large untyped Rails codebases are described as painful, though Sorbet is suggested as a mitigation.", "quotes": [{"id": 757596144, "item_id": 47349759, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47349759", "by": "sensanaty", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "compare", "quote": "I love Rails, but after working for a few places with huge Rails codebases and then several other places with .NET and other frameworks with actual typing, I just can't go back to Rails", "excerpt": "I love Rails, but after working for a few places with huge Rails codebases and then several other places with .NET and other frameworks with actual typing, I just can't go back to Rails for anything that isn't a personal project. Working with a large codebase with an untyped codebase is just a nightmare, even with powerful IDEs like RubyMine that are able to cover some of the paint points. I wonder how good Sorbet is", "context": "worked at places with large Rails and .NET codebases", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 757773121, "item_id": 47360820, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47360820", "by": "liamgriffiths", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I would happily work on a Rails system today too.", "excerpt": "To all the folks in here that bemoan the lack of static types, I'd like to mention there are some great solutions in this space, eg. https://sorbet.org/ Having the productivity of Ruby + the static typing and LSP integrations is a wonderful combination. Sure, it might be less aesthetic than some might like, but at least in my experience, it works very well in practice and supports most of the needs I have from a type", "context": "", "use_case": "web framework", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}]}, {"label": "Community controversy", "summary": "Some commenters cite controversy around Rails and DHH as driving developers away.", "quotes": [{"id": 793902320, "item_id": 49618895, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49618895", "by": "dzonga", "date": "2026-09-09", "stance": "warn", "quote": "now that Rails has a lot of controversy and not really worth then of course users dropped off.", "excerpt": "the issue is largely with the community not cz of UI libraries. ruby is largely built around Rails. so when rails was hot & the trade-offs were worth it grew. now that Rails has a lot of controversy and not really worth then of course users dropped off. within the JS community - the only two things that have a large market share are a express.js & React. but then again not everyone is forced into using them so even i", "context": "", "use_case": "web framework", "switched_from": "", "story": "One decision put Ruby into a downward spiral. It's not too late to fix it"}, {"id": 781674704, "item_id": 48854669, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48854669", "by": "senderista", "date": "2026-07-09", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "although I used Rails for a few personal projects", "excerpt": "In the case of Ruby, the contrast between the early community pre-Rails and what came after is astounding. Partly comes down to the personality differences between Matz and DHH, I guess. I loved the community pre-2005 and had no interest in engaging with it afterward (although I used Rails for a few personal projects).", "context": "", "use_case": "personal projects", "switched_from": "", "story": "Interview with Mitchell Hashimoto about Ghostty and Zig"}, {"id": 757558544, "item_id": 47347409, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47347409", "by": "shafyy", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I have been using Rails for over a decade now and always liked the focus on writing beautiful and simple code.", "excerpt": "The main line on the Rails website now reads: > Accelerate your agents with convention over configuration. Ruby on Rails scales from PROMPT to IPO. Token-efficient code that's easy for agents to write and beautiful for humans to review And I fucking hate it. If I read this the first time I would think this is some kind of tool to optimize your LLM agents. I have been using Rails for over a decade now and always liked", "context": "Rails user for over a decade", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}]}, {"label": "Learning curve", "summary": "Newcomers may struggle with the app structure and with docs that assume prior Ruby/Rails knowledge.", "quotes": [{"id": 757560416, "item_id": 47347526, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47347526", "by": "paozac", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love rails and the recent improvements are great.", "excerpt": "I love rails and the recent improvements are great. I have the impression, though, that these days it only appeals to those who picked it up before version 3 or 4, when it was smaller, maybe more understandable, and incredibly better than all the competing frameworks (except Django maybe). If your first contact with rails is version 7+ and you\u2019re only comfortable with JS/TS, then you\u2019re not going to get it and might ", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 737809521, "item_id": 46113095, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46113095", "by": "ErroneousBosh", "date": "2025-12-01", "stance": "compare", "quote": "the documentation kind of assumed you already knew a lot about Ruby and indeed Rails", "excerpt": "Back in the olden days, maybe about 20 years ago, two web frameworks were really starting to change the way a lot of people thought about web development. Not the people at the company I worked for, sadly, which is why I went to work for someone else, but there you go. These were Django, and Ruby on Rails. I already knew Python, and Django was really well-written, and had great documentation, and I could get going wi", "context": "Python developer", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Response to \"Ruby Is Not a Serious Programming Language\""}, {"id": 797435232, "item_id": 49839702, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49839702", "by": "sejje", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Once you know it, you'll be very fast. I loved it when I used it professionally.", "excerpt": "> how the pieces of a Rails app fit together, but it sure would be handy Best thing you can do is get a fuzzy file search, but you'll learn the structure soon enough. Once you know it, you'll be very fast. I loved it when I used it professionally.", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rails World 2026 Opening Keynote [video]"}]}, {"label": "Resource usage", "summary": "One user cut peak memory from 700MB to 60MB by moving apps to a Rust framework.", "quotes": [{"id": 802879409, "item_id": 50179963, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50179963", "by": "xutopia", "date": "2026-10-21", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Rails was truly wonderful in its heyday", "excerpt": "Rails developer for 20+ years. I converted 3 of 4 apps running on a 4GB VPS to Loco (short for Locomotive: a Rust framework using the Rails conventions). I am really happy with the switch. Heaviest app went from 700MB of RAM usage at peak to 60MB and can handle 30x traffic before it hits an I/O wall. I save 20$ a month because I downgraded my VPS to 2GB and am now able to fit new projects that sat underplayed on my p", "context": "Rails developer for 20+ years", "use_case": "web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Does Ruby on Rails still make sense?"}]}, {"label": "Upgrade maintenance", "summary": "Updating years-old projects and their dependencies takes significant time.", "quotes": [{"id": 757564400, "item_id": 47347775, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47347775", "by": "f311a", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "compare", "quote": "I love the batteries that RoR or Django gives you, but then I also remember how much time it takes to maintain old projects.", "excerpt": "I love the batteries that RoR or Django gives you, but then I also remember how much time it takes to maintain old projects. Updating a project that was started 5-6 years ago takes a lot of time. Part of that is managing dependencies. For Django, they can easily go above 100. Some of them have to be compiled with specific versions of system libraries. Even Docker does not save you from a lot of problems. Right now, I", "context": "", "use_case": "web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}]}], "who": [{"by": "PaulRobinson", "context": "started UK's first Ruby on Rails consultancy in 2006", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50179976", "date": "2026-10-21"}, {"by": "xutopia", "context": "Rails developer for 20+ years", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50179963", "date": "2026-10-21"}, {"by": "status_quo69", "context": "Rails developer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49838776", "date": "2026-09-25"}, {"by": "jrochkind1", "context": "Rails developer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49650560", "date": "2026-09-10"}, {"by": "codeprimate", "context": "senior engineer, twenty years shipping software", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49187643", "date": "2026-08-05"}, {"by": "schappim", "context": "runs a Rails ecommerce store", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49139347", "date": "2026-08-01"}, {"by": "throwatdem12311", "context": "works with Rails at work", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48859201", "date": "2026-07-10"}, {"by": "Kaliboy", "context": "works at a company with large tables", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48420069", "date": "2026-06-05"}, {"by": "ramon156", "context": "building SaaS apps", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48290413", "date": "2026-05-26"}, {"by": "faangguyindia", "context": "solo dev", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48156907", "date": "2026-05-15"}, {"by": "dchuk", "context": "Rails developer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47773103", "date": "2026-04-14"}, {"by": "louiskottmann", "context": "Rails DevOps, one-man web shop for 10+ years", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47347768", "date": "2026-03-12"}], "tags": ["for solo devs", "for CRUD apps", "for SaaS apps", "for ecommerce", "for prototyping"], "use_cases": ["web development", "web apps", "web framework", "small web sites", "ecommerce/crud apps", "early-stage web apps"], "compared": [{"slug": "django", "name": "Django", "co": 15, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "react", "name": "React", "co": 6, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "spring-boot", "name": "Spring Boot", "co": 2, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "postgresql", "name": "PostgreSQL", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "loco", "name": "Loco", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "laravel", "name": "Laravel", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47347064", "title": "Returning to Rails in 2026", "mentions": 7}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49839664", "title": "What About Rails?", "mentions": 3}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49817680", "title": "Rails World 2026 Opening Keynote [video]", "mentions": 3}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46709543", "title": "Show HN: Rails UI", "mentions": 3}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50158314", "title": "Does Ruby on Rails still make sense?", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48750527", "title": "Hanami 3.0: In Full Bloom", "mentions": 2}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {"compare": 1, "recommend": 4}, "2026-01": {"neutral": 2, "recommend": 3}, "2026-02": {"neutral": 1, "recommend": 2}, "2026-03": {"neutral": 1, "recommend": 5, "compare": 2}, "2026-04": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-05": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-06": {"neutral": 3, "recommend": 3}, "2026-07": {"neutral": 3, "compare": 1, "recommend": 2}, "2026-08": {"recommend": 3, "neutral": 2}, "2026-09": {"warn": 1, "neutral": 3, "recommend": 4}, "2026-10": {"neutral": 3, "recommend": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 802879616, "item_id": 50179976, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50179976", "by": "PaulRobinson", "date": "2026-10-21", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Things I think make sense for Rails in the LLM era:", "excerpt": "Background: I started the UK's first dedicated Ruby on Rails consultancy in Manchester, in the Summer of 2006 (called Vagueware - still love that name). I made this decision when Rails was at version 1.1.2. It was a bit of a brave call. I stopped writing Ruby and Rails code in anger ~6 years ago. Change in jobs, roles, etc. and for my side projects I'm mostly tinkering in python and C, and zig appeals to me, but then", "context": "started UK's first Ruby on Rails consultancy in 2006", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Does Ruby on Rails still make sense?"}, {"id": 802879409, "item_id": 50179963, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50179963", "by": "xutopia", "date": "2026-10-21", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Rails was truly wonderful in its heyday", "excerpt": "Rails developer for 20+ years. I converted 3 of 4 apps running on a 4GB VPS to Loco (short for Locomotive: a Rust framework using the Rails conventions). I am really happy with the switch. Heaviest app went from 700MB of RAM usage at peak to 60MB and can handle 30x traffic before it hits an I/O wall. I save 20$ a month because I downgraded my VPS to 2GB and am now able to fit new projects that sat underplayed on my p", "context": "Rails developer for 20+ years", "use_case": "web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Does Ruby on Rails still make sense?"}, {"id": 801350944, "item_id": 50084434, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50084434", "by": "flossly", "date": "2026-10-14", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "So I now no longer use Rails for new projects.", "excerpt": "Just a few years ago, before the LLM-assisted-coding-era, I already did not like frameworks as much as I used to. I liked Rails. But that was more because through Rails I learned the MVC pattern, learned the layer-middelware pattern from Rack (and the ActiveRecord ORM -- but I now no longer like ORMs but that's a different story). Those 2 pattern I still use today in some way or form, and I find them in many modern (", "context": "", "use_case": "web apps", "switched_from": "Rails", "story": "Do Frameworks Matter Anymore?"}, {"id": 801131728, "item_id": 50070733, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50070733", "by": "PaulRobinson", "date": "2026-10-13", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I spent years as a Rails dev", "excerpt": "What's inefficient about this approach? I'd wager a CGI written in C uses less memory and CPU than an equivalent application in any other language or framework. I'd wager this design has lower latency meaning higher throughput and therefore higher capacity, too. Or perhaps you mean developer efficiency? Well, with the right tools you're going to catch memory issues so they're gone. It's a tiny language you can keep i", "context": "former Rails dev", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "A Modern Web App in C"}, {"id": 800234896, "item_id": 50014681, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50014681", "by": "bradly", "date": "2026-10-09", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "small Ruby on Rails sites on a single $10 vps", "excerpt": "I run a bunch of static sites and small Ruby on Rails sites on a single $10 vps. I also serve my birdnet front end from it. I have a separate $20 vps I use for a honeypot with an old domain that was one of the hardcoded control servers for stuxnet.", "context": "", "use_case": "small web sites", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What do you run on a $5 VPS that's worth keeping online 24/7?"}, {"id": 797615537, "item_id": 49850971, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49850971", "by": "jp_sc", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Twenty years ago, for a brand new web framework written from scratch, and by then they had already fixed it.", "excerpt": "Twenty years ago, for a brand new web framework written from scratch, and by then they had already fixed it. Every web framework was trash at the time. And the alternative was custom PHP code probably ridden of SQL injections. I used TurboGears and restarting your web server with a cron job was a pretty common suggestion to \"handle\" memory leaks.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "What About Rails?"}, {"id": 797570320, "item_id": 49848145, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49848145", "by": "dysoco", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "something as batteries-included and expressive like Rails or Django", "excerpt": "But they fill different niches, there's no way I'm going to choose Rust+Axum as much as I love Rust for an ecommerce/CRUD vs something as batteries-included and expressive like Rails or Django.", "context": "", "use_case": "ecommerce/CRUD apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "What About Rails?"}, {"id": 797525955, "item_id": 49845372, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49845372", "by": "flossly", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I really appreciate Rails and DHH's approach though", "excerpt": "I moved from Ruby+Rails, though some other frameworks that I had no choice in (inherited the projects), to my new place of refuge: Kotlin+http4k. Kotlin is a very acceptable Ruby-with-types. Even better than the new Ruby with optional types. It reads the same, it writes very similar, and it produces very similar \"style\" of code. I like the be on the FP side; Kotlin (as Ruby) allows that. I dont mind some OO in there;", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "What About Rails?"}, {"id": 797446608, "item_id": 49840413, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49840413", "by": "db48x", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Ruby and Rails both go out of their way to provide the developer with as much power as they can.", "excerpt": "I agree with him. All software should be written in safe languages, but there is a wide selection available. For new projects you should pick a language that does as much for you as possible. Ruby and Rails both go out of their way to provide the developer with as much power as they can. They make development less expensive. That\u2019s exactly what you want when you are first building something, before you know exactly w", "context": "", "use_case": "early-stage web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rails World 2026 Opening Keynote [video]"}, {"id": 797435232, "item_id": 49839702, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49839702", "by": "sejje", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Once you know it, you'll be very fast. I loved it when I used it professionally.", "excerpt": "> how the pieces of a Rails app fit together, but it sure would be handy Best thing you can do is get a fuzzy file search, but you'll learn the structure soon enough. Once you know it, you'll be very fast. I loved it when I used it professionally.", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rails World 2026 Opening Keynote [video]"}, {"id": 797420416, "item_id": 49838776, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49838776", "by": "status_quo69", "date": "2026-09-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Rails dev here, still using it, still plan on using it, use agents", "excerpt": "Rails dev here, still using it, still plan on using it, use agents, don't see them making food gun decisions with rails apis just code. Rails comes with the console by default, so production inspection of a bug is something the ai can do without a ton of bs to be set up, and that console can be forced to be auditable (using standard gems) or read only (using flags). I used to love rust, still do sorta, but yeah I thi", "context": "Rails developer", "use_case": "web development with agents", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rails World 2026 Opening Keynote [video]"}, {"id": 794408960, "item_id": 49650560, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49650560", "by": "jrochkind1", "date": "2026-09-10", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I work in Rails too, I try to keep them to a minimum", "excerpt": "On theweb, not surprised that Rails switched from kind of encouraging people to use as many browser-automated tests (under whatever name) as possible , to trying to discourage people from using any. Rails way really likes being absolutist. I work in Rails too, I try to keep them to a minimum, but I definitely try to do at least one happy-path test of any major page (which includes automated accessibility audit), goin", "context": "Rails developer", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Shopify is moving from React Native back to Swift and Kotlin"}, {"id": 793902320, "item_id": 49618895, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49618895", "by": "dzonga", "date": "2026-09-09", "stance": "warn", "quote": "now that Rails has a lot of controversy and not really worth then of course users dropped off.", "excerpt": "the issue is largely with the community not cz of UI libraries. ruby is largely built around Rails. so when rails was hot & the trade-offs were worth it grew. now that Rails has a lot of controversy and not really worth then of course users dropped off. within the JS community - the only two things that have a large market share are a express.js & React. but then again not everyone is forced into using them so even i", "context": "", "use_case": "web framework", "switched_from": "", "story": "One decision put Ruby into a downward spiral. It's not too late to fix it"}, {"id": 789756753, "item_id": 49359797, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49359797", "by": "NameError", "date": "2026-08-19", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "into a rails app (that hosts both draw.city", "excerpt": "Thanks! The population/demographic data is all freely available from the US Census and stored in a PostGIS database (hence the site being US-only for now- if I wanted to make it global, there are global gridded population data sets but they aren't as detailed). The geography data is all pulled in w/ some long-running background tasks into a rails app (that hosts both draw.city and another site I've shared here in the", "context": "", "use_case": "hosting site and background tasks", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Draw.city \u2013 geography game where you circle the target population [US]"}, {"id": 788430481, "item_id": 49276905, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49276905", "by": "x0x0", "date": "2026-08-12", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "rails, because it's what I regularly use", "excerpt": "no api. The way it works is thus (rails, because it's what I regularly use): The system is called Turbo. A turbo_frame is just a custom html element. You can largely use it instead of a div. Turbo's js watches for navigation events (link clicks, form submits) that originate inside one of these elements, and instead of letting the browser do a full navigation, it: 1 - makes the request itself, against the usual rails ", "context": "", "use_case": "web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "HTML over WebSockets: real-time SPAs with barely any JavaScript"}, {"id": 787109490, "item_id": 49194343, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49194343", "by": "0x4d4c", "date": "2026-08-06", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Since them I'm on Rails.", "excerpt": "I remember, when I used it for the very first time in commercial project. Client briefed me in the afternoon, the next day, before the noon, she got ugly app, but with fully working admin backend. She was sold. But I also remember, that some non-standard requirements were really difficult to implement or get around. Having that in mind, the next project was entirely in Pylons. All was good, until we were asked to add", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "Pylons", "story": "What I love about Django"}, {"id": 787002288, "item_id": 49187643, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49187643", "by": "codeprimate", "date": "2026-08-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "The depth sits in Rails and Postgres", "excerpt": "Location: Bellingham, WA Remote: Yes Willing to relocate: No Technologies: Ruby, Rails, PostgreSQL, Sidekiq, Hotwire, JavaScript, Python, AWS, Docker, MCP, LLMs, RSpec R\u00e9sum\u00e9/CV: https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrick-morgan/ GitHub: https://github.com/codeprimate Email: contact at bellingham.dev I have been shipping software for twenty years, most of it Rails, and what I own has always run wider than the code I write. ", "context": "senior engineer, twenty years shipping software", "use_case": "backend web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (August 2026)"}, {"id": 786229552, "item_id": 49139347, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49139347", "by": "schappim", "date": "2026-08-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've recently added RSS and other alternative representations to our Rails based ecom store[1] and rails makes it super easy[1a].", "excerpt": "Google tried to kill RSS, but it is not dead, in fact it is still a huge part of the Open Web Initiative. There is no performance hit or real resource cost in supporting RSS. If big platforms like Shopify can do it, we can support RSS feeds (and more) too! I've recently added RSS and other alternative representations to our Rails based ecom store[1] and rails makes it super easy[1a]. If you're using Rails it is basic", "context": "runs a Rails ecommerce store", "use_case": "ecommerce store with RSS feeds", "switched_from": "", "story": "How Google helped destroy adoption of RSS feeds (2023)"}, {"id": 784030289, "item_id": 49001893, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49001893", "by": "jeffreyrogers", "date": "2026-07-21", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "The product is a fairly standard Ruby on Rails webapp", "excerpt": "Fable works very well for me on a moderately large codebase. I have had to correct it a few times or point it on the right track, but given how much faster it is at programming than I am that's a very minor issue (and most of these errors are because I underspecified what I wanted in the prompt, I can only think of two cases where it was genuinely wrong... that's a lot better than me in my professional career). Code ", "context": "", "use_case": "webapp framework", "switched_from": "", "story": "Kimi K3 Is Competitive with Fable; Kimi K3 and Fable Is SoTA"}, {"id": 783259010, "item_id": 48953688, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48953688", "by": "jjice", "date": "2026-07-17", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Django, Laravel, and Rails are very neat.", "excerpt": "Oh man I'd love a nice full stack framework in Rust! Django, Laravel, and Rails are very neat. I used to be a micro framework kind of guy, but having everything integrated is more and more appealing over the last few years. This would take a long time to get feature complete with the core of those big full stack frameworks, but I'm rooting for it! Getting to use the Rust type system with a full stack web framework so", "context": "", "use_case": "full stack web framework", "switched_from": "", "story": "Topcoat: The full full-stack framework for Rust"}, {"id": 781747216, "item_id": 48859201, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48859201", "by": "throwatdem12311", "date": "2026-07-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "the reason we use Rails is pretty simple\u2026it\u2019s great, it\u2019s battle tested and has a massive ecosystem.", "excerpt": "We work with Rails but there is more to programming (and Ruby) than work. Sinatra micro services were a thing for a while. Hanami is decent. But the reason we use Rails is pretty simple\u2026it\u2019s great, it\u2019s battle tested and has a massive ecosystem. I don\u2019t even care that DHH is a Nazi because you know what I can use it for non-Nazi stuff and there\u2019s nothing he can do about it. I get his labour for free. He\u2019s like my lit", "context": "works with Rails at work", "use_case": "work web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "How to Start a Ruby Meetup"}, {"id": 781674704, "item_id": 48854669, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48854669", "by": "senderista", "date": "2026-07-09", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "although I used Rails for a few personal projects", "excerpt": "In the case of Ruby, the contrast between the early community pre-Rails and what came after is astounding. Partly comes down to the personality differences between Matz and DHH, I guess. I loved the community pre-2005 and had no interest in engaging with it afterward (although I used Rails for a few personal projects).", "context": "", "use_case": "personal projects", "switched_from": "", "story": "Interview with Mitchell Hashimoto about Ghostty and Zig"}, {"id": 780345346, "item_id": 48771584, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48771584", "by": "rahil627", "date": "2026-07-02", "stance": "compare", "quote": "implicit object function magicks (rails)", "excerpt": "wow, ai told me this was for enterprise-size apps, \"symfony of the ruby world\" (dependency injection, data mapping..), to which i nearly puked, and avoided since.. it's really interesting to see people try to design things in a clearer way (explicit, modular, functional/immutable, less cpu indirection/execution, etc.) in ruby. I'm new to this language, but i think it's cool that for one big framework go all in on the", "context": "new to Ruby", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Hanami 3.0: In Full Bloom"}, {"id": 780064768, "item_id": 48754048, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48754048", "by": "JustSkyfall", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I have been using Rails 8 for the past few months on a work project", "excerpt": "Big congrats on the release! I have been using Rails 8 for the past few months on a work project, but the Hanakai ecosystem looks really, really interesting. My one question would be whether or not Hanakai supports Inertia or Svelte views - we've been moving away from ERB recently, which has made it much easier to write interactive code due to the ecosystem, and I'd rather not throw that DX away!", "context": "", "use_case": "work project", "switched_from": "", "story": "Hanami 3.0: In Full Bloom"}, {"id": 779434096, "item_id": 48714631, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48714631", "by": "kristianp", "date": "2026-06-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "For web apps, Rails, Django, Laravel.", "excerpt": "Websites or web apps? For web apps, Rails, Django, Laravel. React is the \"standard\" client framework of the last number of years. Perhaps someone can give advice about those web techs.", "context": "", "use_case": "web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Is WordPress the best way to create new websites for beginner"}, {"id": 777257057, "item_id": 48578566, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48578566", "by": "dchuk", "date": "2026-06-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Mine is pretty vanilla ruby on rails", "excerpt": "Nice job, clean and well built. I built something very similar, with a focus on engineering/product/startup blogs https://engineered.at What's your tech stack? Mine is pretty vanilla ruby on rails, while my site is closed source, I did open source a rails engine for adaptive monitoring of RSS feeds that does a lot of the heavy lifting: https://github.com/dchuk/source_monitor", "context": "", "use_case": "web app stack", "switched_from": "", "story": "Hacker News but for Independent Blogs"}, {"id": 775684545, "item_id": 48480284, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48480284", "by": "kstrauser", "date": "2026-06-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "90% of the SPAs I use could be Django/Rails/Flask apps with no noticeable difference", "excerpt": "90% of the SPAs I use could be Django/Rails/Flask apps with no noticeable difference, other than that they'd be many times more responsive on slower devices. \"Old\" SSR apps are mature, not obsolete. It's ridiculous when they're not considered even when they'd be the right tool for the job. I wouldn't try to clone Google Docs in Django, but something like Linear could 100% be modeled as a CRUD app with new page loads ", "context": "", "use_case": "server-rendered web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Building an HTML-first site doubled our users overnight"}, {"id": 775324512, "item_id": 48457782, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48457782", "by": "ClikeX", "date": "2026-06-09", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Github was a lot simpler when it was still just a Rails app.", "excerpt": "Not literally. And I would hardly say it was a matter of language superiority. I love Ruby myself. But Github was a lot simpler when it was still just a Rails app. But Rails was SSR by default, and most of the frontend was just Embedded Ruby (ERB) template files all over the place. And way back when, it was even relatively common to use Javascript supersets like CoffeeScript[1] and Opal[2]. The latter being Ruby that", "context": "", "use_case": "GitHub's early web app", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Gitdot \u2013 a better GitHub. Open-source, anti-AI, and written in Rust"}, {"id": 774721104, "item_id": 48420069, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48420069", "by": "Kaliboy", "date": "2026-06-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "since we use Rails we can have it query the tables apart and join the tables through the defined model", "excerpt": "Yeah but the increased I/O is cheaper. It's easier to add another webserver as opposed to upgrading your db server. And I don't think it's as simple as you make it. So where I work we use amongst other things Rails. There are places in our codebase where using joins just isn't feasable cause the database would use too much memory and let's just say N is large. But since we use Rails we can have it query the tables ap", "context": "works at a company with large tables", "use_case": "web application framework", "switched_from": "", "story": "pg_durable: Microsoft open sources in-database durable execution"}, {"id": 774636256, "item_id": 48414766, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48414766", "by": "estebarb", "date": "2026-06-05", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Simply Ruby on Rails.", "excerpt": "Simply Ruby on Rails. I maintain 3 markdown documents with system design, implementation plan and use cases in repo. Then tell it those files exist and go implement X feature (from implementation plan). These documents, plus AGENTS.md, declare completion criteria, which includes full code coverage both with system and controller tests. Usually I don't tell it to implement something adhoc, I first implement it in the ", "context": "", "use_case": "LLM-assisted app development", "switched_from": "", "story": "DeepSeek reasonix, engineered for low token cost during long running sessions"}, {"id": 772646608, "item_id": 48290413, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48290413", "by": "ramon156", "date": "2026-05-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "RoR is.. \"good enough\".", "excerpt": "Hey I'm in the same boat! I love Go and Rust, they're wonderful languages with their own ups and downs. Sadly I never was able to build a SaaS app with either. Something about a square peg and a round hole... I could be very wrong, but there's a lot of gadgets that come with a SaaS tool, and I'm not inventing them. RoR is.. \"good enough\". I can opt-in types whenever, I can build things quick, the tooling is alright, ", "context": "building SaaS apps", "use_case": "building SaaS apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "From Rust to Ruby"}, {"id": 770510512, "item_id": 48156907, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48156907", "by": "faangguyindia", "date": "2026-05-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "For solo devs, Rails is arguably most productive webapp system.", "excerpt": "Who even uses Erlang? I used Rails and then i tried Phoenix and it was lot more difficult to get things done. I don't understand Phoenix hype For solo devs, Rails is arguably most productive webapp system. LLM is very good at writing ruby rails code. Much better than writing django in my experience even though python training corpus is huge. I write my experimental apps in Rail when it stabilizes, i do a Go rewrite. ", "context": "solo dev", "use_case": "building web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Erlang/OTP 29.0"}, {"id": 764369650, "item_id": 47773103, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47773103", "by": "dchuk", "date": "2026-04-14", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I\u2019m a Rails guy myself", "excerpt": "Ignore all the hate in the comments here, anyone denying the direction of software development and it aggressively becoming agentic have their own reckonings to deal with\u2026 I love this concept. While I\u2019m a Rails guy myself, I appreciate the value of Django too, and an agent-optimized version of it makes sense. I feel like the next logical steps are this exact concept but in Go / Rust to get even more performance out o", "context": "Rails developer", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Plain \u2013 The full-stack Python framework designed for humans and agents"}, {"id": 761203232, "item_id": 47575202, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47575202", "by": "moondowner", "date": "2026-03-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Switched from Spring Boot to Ruby on Rails 3 years ago.", "excerpt": "Switched from Spring Boot to Ruby on Rails 3 years ago. I expected to see some new Spring 'tricks' in this post, but it's pretty much regular things that people might do in larger codebases.", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "Spring Boot", "story": "Spring Boot Done Right: Lessons from a 400-Module Codebase"}, {"id": 757773121, "item_id": 47360820, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47360820", "by": "liamgriffiths", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I would happily work on a Rails system today too.", "excerpt": "To all the folks in here that bemoan the lack of static types, I'd like to mention there are some great solutions in this space, eg. https://sorbet.org/ Having the productivity of Ruby + the static typing and LSP integrations is a wonderful combination. Sure, it might be less aesthetic than some might like, but at least in my experience, it works very well in practice and supports most of the needs I have from a type", "context": "", "use_case": "web framework", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 757596144, "item_id": 47349759, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47349759", "by": "sensanaty", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "compare", "quote": "I love Rails, but after working for a few places with huge Rails codebases and then several other places with .NET and other frameworks with actual typing, I just can't go back to Rails", "excerpt": "I love Rails, but after working for a few places with huge Rails codebases and then several other places with .NET and other frameworks with actual typing, I just can't go back to Rails for anything that isn't a personal project. Working with a large codebase with an untyped codebase is just a nightmare, even with powerful IDEs like RubyMine that are able to cover some of the paint points. I wonder how good Sorbet is", "context": "worked at places with large Rails and .NET codebases", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 757584864, "item_id": 47349054, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47349054", "by": "dzonga", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Rails for straight up CRUD is top, autogenerated things etc", "excerpt": "Rails for straight up CRUD is top, autogenerated things etc however if your app doesn't fit the standard crud pattern you end just fiddling with a lot of things that you shouldn't and in that case I recommend Django which provides enough flexibility while providing a good base. There's less magic in Django", "context": "", "use_case": "CRUD apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 757564400, "item_id": 47347775, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47347775", "by": "f311a", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "compare", "quote": "I love the batteries that RoR or Django gives you, but then I also remember how much time it takes to maintain old projects.", "excerpt": "I love the batteries that RoR or Django gives you, but then I also remember how much time it takes to maintain old projects. Updating a project that was started 5-6 years ago takes a lot of time. Part of that is managing dependencies. For Django, they can easily go above 100. Some of them have to be compiled with specific versions of system libraries. Even Docker does not save you from a lot of problems. Right now, I", "context": "", "use_case": "web apps", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 757564288, "item_id": 47347768, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47347768", "by": "louiskottmann", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I've been a Rails DevOps and nowadays a web one-man-show with it for over 10 years and I'd do it again.", "excerpt": "I've been a Rails DevOps and nowadays a web one-man-show with it for over 10 years and I'd do it again. Not many frameworks have been thriving that long, and there's good reason. It packs everything, is tidy and productive, with a pleasant language to read and write. In the latest Stackoverflow survey, it's back at the \"top 5 of desired stacks to use for next project\" over a decade after its inception ! Give it a try", "context": "Rails DevOps, one-man web shop for 10+ years", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 757560416, "item_id": 47347526, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47347526", "by": "paozac", "date": "2026-03-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love rails and the recent improvements are great.", "excerpt": "I love rails and the recent improvements are great. I have the impression, though, that these days it only appeals to those who picked it up before version 3 or 4, when it was smaller, maybe more understandable, and incredibly better than all the competing frameworks (except Django maybe). If your first contact with rails is version 7+ and you\u2019re only comfortable with JS/TS, then you\u2019re not going to get it and might ", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Returning to Rails in 2026"}, {"id": 752985600, "item_id": 47061600, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47061600", "by": "aristofun", "date": "2026-02-18", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "only Ruby on Rails world seems to systematically care about devx and infra friction", "excerpt": "Unfortunately only Ruby on Rails world seems to systematically care about devx and infra friction. Others just got used to throwing more money and people on it.", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tell HN: We analyzed our dev time.80% is still infrastructure'setup',notfeatures"}, {"id": 742005968, "item_id": 46375373, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46375373", "by": "anon5739483", "date": "2025-12-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is why I use Ruby on Rails. Shared constraints and boring conventions age better than clever mini-frameworks", "excerpt": "This is why I use Ruby on Rails. Shared constraints and boring conventions age better than clever mini-frameworks built around one team's mental model.", "context": "", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Avoid Mini-Frameworks"}]}