effector vs xstate
xstate is downloaded 49.8× more often than effector (20,263,809 vs 406,673 per month), so it has the larger community and more answered questions online. effector ships 13% less gzipped JavaScript (12.3 kB vs 14.1 kB), which matters if bundle size is a priority. Both projects are actively maintained.
| Metric | effector | xstate |
|---|---|---|
| Weekly downloads | 108,584 | 4,469,231✓ |
| Monthly downloads | 406,673 | 20,263,809✓ |
| GitHub stars | 4,837 | 29,666✓ |
| Minified size | 28.9 kB✓ | 44.7 kB |
| Minified + gzipped | 12.3 kB✓ | 14.1 kB |
| Dependencies | 0 | 0 |
| Open issues | 156 | 123✓ |
| Last commit | 2026-05-13 | 2026-06-01✓ |
| Latest version | 23.4.4 | 5.32.0 |
| License | MIT | MIT |
When to choose which
effector
Reactive logic from events, stores and effects.
Choose it when: Complex reactive business logic you want strongly typed and framework-agnostic, decoupled from the view.
- + Powerful reactive primitives
- + Excellent TypeScript
- + Framework-agnostic
- - Smaller community
- - New vocabulary to learn
xstate
Explicit state machines and statecharts.
Choose it when: Complex flows (wizards, async sequences, UI with many states) where you want logic that is explicit, testable and visualizable.
- + Impossible states become impossible
- + Visualizable logic
- + Framework-agnostic
- - Steepest learning curve here
- - Overkill for simple state
Feature comparison
| Feature | effector | xstate |
|---|---|---|
| Paradigm | Events / effects | State machines |
| First-class TypeScript | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Works outside React | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Dedicated devtools | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Built-in async / server state | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Boilerplate | Medium | High |
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[](https://devcompare.dev/compare/effector-vs-xstate)Data from npm, Bundlephobia and GitHub. Last updated 2026-06-02.