Features
- Massive ecosystem of loaders and plugins
- Advanced code splitting and lazy loading
- Module federation for micro-frontend architectures
- Highly configurable for any build scenario
Pros
- Most mature bundler with the largest ecosystem
- Handles virtually any build requirement
- Module federation is unique and powerful
Cons
- Significantly slower than Rust/Go-based alternatives
- Configuration complexity is notoriously high
- Dev server startup is slow for large projects
Overview
Webpack is the JavaScript module bundler that defined modern frontend build tooling. Since its creation in 2012, it has grown into the most widely used bundler in the JavaScript ecosystem, powering everything from small projects to massive enterprise applications.
Webpack introduced concepts that are now standard across all bundlers: loaders for transforming files, plugins for extending build behavior, code splitting for performance optimization, and hot module replacement for developer experience. Its Module Federation feature enables micro-frontend architectures that are difficult to achieve with other tools.
While newer tools like Vite and esbuild offer faster builds, Webpack remains relevant for projects that need its unique features (particularly Module Federation) or have extensive existing Webpack configurations.
When to Use
Use Webpack for legacy projects already built on it, or when you specifically need Module Federation. For new projects, consider Vite or Rspack (which offers Webpack compatibility with better performance).
Getting Started
npm install --save-dev webpack webpack-cli
npx webpack --entry ./src/index.js --output-path ./dist