Changelog for React-Rails

May 16, 2026 · View on GitHub

If you need help upgrading react-rails, webpacker to shakapacker, or JS packages, contact justin@shakacode.com. We can upgrade your project and improve your development and customer experiences, allowing you to focus on building new features or fixing bugs instead.

For an overview of working with us, see our Client Engagement Model article and how we bill for time.

We also specialize in helping development teams lower infrastructure and CI costs. Check out our project Control Plane Flow, which can allow you to get the ease of Heroku with the power of Kubernetes and big cost savings.

If you think ShakaCode can help your project, click here to book a call with Justin Gordon, the creator of React on Rails and Shakapacker.

You also might want to consider the react_on_rails gem.

Unreleased

Changes since the last non-beta release.

Please add entries here for your pull requests that have not yet been released. Include LINKS for PRs and committers.

3.3.1 - 2026-05-15

Fixed

  • Preserve default controller layouts for render component: after the Rails 8 render pipeline change. PR 1418 by justin808. Fixes #1356.
  • Remove unneeded runtime dependencies. PR 1420 by G-Rath.
  • Fix Propshaft asset version cache busting so server-rendered bundles invalidate correctly when assets change. PR 1403.

3.3.0 - 2026-03-31

Added

Fixed

3.2.1 - 2024-05-16

Fixed

  • Replaced call to ReactRailsUJS.unmountComponents that was erroneously removed by PR 1290 in 3.0.0 PR 1339.

  • Prevent roots from being re-created when using React 18 PR 1305 by diogobeda

3.2.0 - 2024-01-10

Changed

  • Support other JS package managers using package_json gem PR #1306 by G-Rath.
  • Make es6 and ts usable at same time. #1299

3.1.1 - 2023-08-16

Removed

  • Removed the replace-null functionality due a severe logic error added in 3.1.0 #1300

3.1.0 - 2023-08-15

Added

  • Added option to replace nulls in props with undefined via config.react.null_to_undefined_props in config/application.rb #1293

3.0.0 - 2023-08-14

Breaking Changes

  • Requires separate compilations for server & client bundles if using Shakapacker (see Webpack config) #1274
  • Replaces WebpackManifestContainer, which searched for assets in the webpack manifest, with SeparateServerBundleContainer, which expects a single server bundle file & does not use the webpack manifest at all. #1274
  • Upgrades React-Rails' embedded react to v18.2.0. Uses node polyfill plugin & fast-text-encoder for SSR text encoding. #1290
  • If using Webpacker/Shakapacker, requires upgrading to Shakapacker v7 #1274 and #1285

Changed

  • The react:component generator now generates a function component by default #1271

2.7.1 - 2023-05-19

Bug Fixes

  • Fix ReactDomClient initialization error during SSR. #1278

2.7.0 - 2023-05-06

#1209 2.7 Release Discussion

New Features

  • Camelizes keys with primitive values, in addition to hashes #946
  • Expose alternative implementations for ReactUJS.getConstructor #1050
  • Include turbolinks in dev and update webdrivers #1174
  • Add support for multiple require.context with addition of useContexts #1144
  • Update many dependencies

Bug Fixes

  • Fix installation crash caused by absolute path for source_entry_path in default config/webpacker.yml coming from shakapacker version 6.x - #1216
  • Fix warning for loading react-dom in React 18 - #1269

2.6.2

New Features

  • React 16.14
  • Support for ShakaPacker
  • Preparation for React 18 #1151

Bug Fixes

  • URI.open instead of open #1099
  • No longer unmount components on Turbolinks navigation #1135

2.6.1

Breaking Changes

New Features

  • React 16.9.0
  • Sprockets users get React_UJS 2.6.1

Deprecation

  • Removed tests for Rails 3, 4, 5.0
  • Removed tests for Sprockets 2
  • Removed tests for Webpacker 1.1, 2

Bug Fixes

  • React_UJS 2.6.1 still complies with ES5 #1027 #1026 #1016
  • Support RubyGems pattern for Alpha releases when detecting sprockets version #1047

2.6.0

Breaking Changes

New Features

  • Typescript component generator #990
  • Enhanced Turbolinks Support #978 #962

Deprecation

Bug Fixes

  • assert_react_component will not pass tests where the case was different #979
  • action_controller/test_case was accidentally required in dev #996

2.5.0

Breaking Changes

New Features

  • React 16.8.6 prebundled #977
  • Added assert_react_component test helper #957
  • Supports Webpacker 4, Ruby 2.6 #934
  • Supports camelize on ActionController::Parameters #932

Deprecation

Bug Fixes

  • Linting fix to generated JS #941
  • (Meta) Tests for react-rails updated #892 #894 #916

2.4.7

New Features

  • React 16.4.2 prebundled #914

2.4.6

New Features

  • React 16.4.1 prebundled #909

2.4.5

New Features

  • React 16.3.2 prebundled #908
  • Supports Webpacker 4.x #895
  • Enhanced generator to create components in subdirectories #890
  • Explicitly support Rails 5.2 #893
  • Enhanced documentation for Turbolinks usage #900

2.4.4

New Features

  • React 16.2 prebundled #856, #874
  • Use Fragments instead of Divs by default #856
  • Explicitly support Ruby 2.5 #857
  • Add support for controller rendering using camelize_props #869
  • Many readme, doc and guide updates including Typescript #873, #865, #862, #854, #852, #849

Deprecation

  • Drop explicit support for Ruby 2.1 #866
  • Drop explicit support for Rails 3, 4.0, 4.1 #866
  • If the gem continues to work on Ruby and Rails below what is in Travis, it is accidental.

Bug Fixes

  • Correct behaviour of Turbolinks 5 mounting #868, 848
  • Correct behaviour of JQuery3 removing "on" #867, 762

2.4.3

Bug Fixes

  • Call ReactDOM.render() when react_component :prerender option is falsy, instead of ReactDOM.hydrate() #844, #842

2.4.2

Bug Fixes

  • ReactDOM.hydrate() may not be defined for everyone, it will now use hydrate if it is defined or fallback to render #832

2.4.1

New Features

  • Webpacker gets ES6 components by default #822
  • ReactDOM.hydrate() #828
  • Documentation updates #830

Deprecation

Bug Fixes

  • Webpacker local manifest sometimes had double asset_hosts if the dev server was running #834 thanks @joeyparis

2.4.0

Breaking Changes

  • (Sprockets) Prebundled React upgraded to 16 #792
  • (Sprockets) Addons removed #792

Bug Fixes

  • Coffeescript generator exports correctly #799, #800
  • Running detector manually no longer breaks if Turbolinks is not preset #802

2.3.1

Breaking Changes

  • React Deprecations for 15.4, 15.5, 15.6 in preparation for 16 handled in prebundled version #789, #798

New Features

  • Generator now makes modern style createReactClass(JS) or extends React.Component(ES6, CoffeeScript) code

Deprecation

  • Next version will drop the addons option as they are not supported with React 16
  • TheRubyRacer's newest version (0.12.3 at time of writing) only supports libV8 (3.16.14.15) which is too old for some new JS features, future versions of this gem will need more modern ExecJS runtimes such as mini_racer (currently on libV8 5.9.x)

Bug Fixes

2.3.0

New Features

  • Webpacker and Webpack 3 support #777
  • Update to React 15.6.2 #789

Deprecation

Bug Fixes

2.2.1

New Features

  • Support config.react.server_renderer_directories in initializers #729

Bug Fixes

  • Fix Railtie watcher to update its timestamp when files change #722
  • Don't use yarn binstub because webpacker doesn't provide it anymore #717

2.2.0

New Features

  • Improve error handling when components aren't found #704

Bug Fixes

  • Camelize filename when generating for webpack #703
  • Include node module boilerplate when generating for webpack #710
  • Don't look for non-existent Turbolinks.EVENTS #708

2.1.0 (April 18, 2017)

New Features

  • Support Rails 5.1 #697

Bug Fixes

  • Fix UJS unmounting by selector #696

2.0.2 (April 13, 2017)

New Features

  • Rerun events detection at any time with ReactRailsUJS.detectEvents() #693
  • Make the NPM version of react_ujs match the Rubygem version

2.0.1 was skipped because a bad version of react_ujs was published to NPM.

2.0.0 (April 13, 2017)

Breaking Changes

  • Server rendering loads server_rendering.js by default #471 . Upgrade by adding a new file which requires the previous defaults:

    // app/assets/javascripts/server_rendering.js
// = require react-server
// = require components

New Features

  • Webpacker support:
    • react_component can find components via require.context + ReactRailsUJS.useContext #678
    • Server rendering detects Webpacker and uses packs #683, #687
    • ReactRailsUJS is available from npm with yarn add react_ujs or npm install react_ujs #678
  • per_request_react_rails_prerenderer Allows you to check out a renderer for the whole request instead of once-per-react_component #559

Bug Fixes

  • Improved watching of server-rendering JS files #687
  • Fix console replay:
    • Put the <script> tag outside the React.js container to avoid React warnings #691
    • Clear console history between renders #692
  • Use better Turbolinks events #690

1.11.0 (April 4, 2017)

New Features

  • Support prerender: false when rendering in a controller #680
  • Update React to 15.4.2 #681

Bug Fixes

  • Fix joining asset path in YamlManifestContainer #679
  • Remove coffee-script-source from dependencies. #667 If you have a version conflict, you should specify the proper version yourself.

1.10.0 (October 6, 2016)

Breaking Changes

  • Alias window = this; has been removed from the default server rendering JavaScript to improve detection of the server rendering environment. To get the old behavior, you can add the alias in your own server rendering code. #615

New Features

  • Calling setTimeout or clearTimeout in server rendering will raise an informative error because they aren't supported #618
  • prerender: options will be passed to server renderer methods #641
  • react_component(..., camelize_props:) option will override the application default #642, #645
  • Ship with React.js 15.4.1 #646

Deprecation

Bug Fixes

  • use ['default'] accessor to support old JavaScript versions #619
  • react_component with a block will correctly render the content inside the div

1.9.0 (October 6, 2016)

Breaking Changes

New Features

  • Accept extra JS code in code: option for SprocketsRenderer #604

Bug Fixes

  • Use asset_prefix for YamlContainer #598
  • Fix requiring .js from .es6.jsx #591

1.8.2 (August 9, 2016)

New Features

  • Update to React 15.3.0 #583

Bug Fixes

  • Fix //= require on Sprockets 3.7+ #582

1.8.1 (July 29, 2016)

New Features

  • Update to React 15.2.1 #569

Bug Fixes

  • Fix deprecation warnings on Sprockets 3.7+ #574
  • Stop building broken addons files #576

1.8.0 (June 29, 2016)

New Features

  • Sprockets 4 Support 🎉 #560
  • Depend on Railties, not Rails #558
  • Don't depend on sprockets/railtie #558
  • Expose React.camelize_props(props_hash) #556
  • Add rails generate react:ujs --output=... for copying the UJS into your app #557
  • Support Babel 6 module exports & extension point ReactRailsUJS.getConstructor #503

1.7.2 (June 19, 2016)

New Features

  • Improved error messages for missing components #538

Bug Fixes

  • Fix view_helper_implementation config #551
  • Fallback to EnvironmentContainer for server rendering when manifest isn't available #545

1.7.1 (May 10, 2016)

New Features

  • Update to React 15.0.2 #525

Bug Fixes

  • Update .to_prepare for Rails 5 #526
  • Use register_engine with Sprockets 3 to avoid compiling all files #522

1.7.0 (April 29, 2016)

New Features

  • Update to React 15.0.1 #512
  • Support PJAX #518
  • Static renders don't include data-react- attributes #497

Bug Fixes

  • Better unmounting on Turbolinks 5 #521
  • Fix console replay #496

1.6.2 (February 28, 2016)

Bug Fixes

  • Fix Server Rendering for Rails 3.2 #487

1.6.1 (February 28, 2016)

New Features

  • UJS can mount and unmount a component by ID (not only the component's children) #466
  • Support Turbolinks 5 #475

Bug Fixes

  • Support nested arrays with camelize_props #480
  • Improve Sprockets 3 compatibility #453
  • Fix install-generator require spacing #476

1.6.0 (February 4, 2016)

New Features

  • Individual add-ons can be included in a bundle with sprockets require directives. #457
  • Support sprockets-rails 3 #430
  • Update to React 0.14.6

Bug Fixes

  • Fix install generator when //= requires are malformed #463
  • Use before_action if available #456
  • Add CHANGELOG to gem bundle #471
  • Use window.attachEvent to support IE8 without jQuery 😬#446

1.5.0 (November 25, 2015)

New Features

  • Update to React 0.14.3 #412
  • config.react.camelize_props = true will camelize react_component prop keys #409

Bug Fixes

  • Fix chained .es6 file names with JSX processor #411
  • Don't insert // =requires multiple times #398

1.4.2 (November 5, 2015)

New Features

  • Component generator --coffee option #387
  • Support Sprockets 4 with a JSX processor #385

Bug Fixes

  • Support custom attributes when rendering from controller #384

1.4.1 (October 23, 2015)

Bug Fixes

  • Minify & optimize the production build of React.js #380

1.4.0 (October 22, 2015)

New Features

  • Include React.js 0.14

1.3.3 (October 21, 2015)

Bug Fixes

  • Also support React 0.14 in unmountComponents #372
  • Use a fallback view helper in case a Rails controller wasn't used #375

1.3.2 (October 13, 2015)

New Features

  • The UJS can mount and unmount components within a given DOM node #358
  • Support dropped-in React 0.14 in UJS #366

1.3.1 (September 18, 2015)

Bug Fixes

  • Use controller lifecycle hooks for view helper (tests don't run middlewares) #356

1.3.0 (September 15, 2015)

New Features

  • Render components directly from the controller with render component: ... #329
  • Provide a custom view helper with config.react.view_helper_implementation #346

Bug Fixes

  • Allow react-rails configs to be set in initializers #347

1.2.0 (August 19, 2015)

New Features

  • Support --es6 option in component generator #332
  • Support Sprockets 3 #322

Bug Fixes

  • Don't bother unmounting components onBeforeUnload #318
  • Include React::Rails::VERSION in the gem #335

1.1.0 (July 9, 2015)

Breaking Changes

  • Changed server rendering configuration names #253

    OldNew
    config.react.timeoutconfig.react.server_renderer_timeout
    config.react.max_renderersconfig.react.server_renderer_pool_size
    config.react.react_jsconfig.react.server_renderer_options[:files]
    config.react.component_filenamesconfig.react.server_renderer_options[:files]
    config.react.replay_consoleconfig.react.server_renderer_options[:replay_console]
    (none)config.react.server_renderer

  • JSX is transformed by Babel, not JSTransform #295

New Features

  • Allow custom renderers for server rendering #253
  • Server render with renderToStaticMarkup via prerender: :static #253
  • Accept config.react.jsx_transform_options = {asset_path: "path/to/JSXTransformer.js"} #273
  • Added BabelTransformer for transforming JSX #295
  • Added ExecJSRenderer to server rendering tools
  • Accept config.react.jsx_transformer_class #302

Deprecations

  • JSXTransformer won't be updated

Bug Fixes

  • Fix gem versions in tests #270
  • Expire the Sprockets cache if you change React.js builds #257
  • Instead of copying builds into local directires, add different React.js builds to the asset pipeline #254
  • Camelize attribute names in the component generator #262
  • Add tilt dependency #248
  • Default prerender pool size to 1 #302

1.0.0 (April 7, 2015)

New Features

  • Vendor versions of React.js with config.variant, config.addons and //= require react
  • Component generator
  • View helper and UJS for mounting components
  • Server rendering with prerender: true
  • Transform .jsx in the asset pipeline