Which mobile framework offers better startup and runtime performance in 2025—Flutter or React Native?

Compares startup times, UI rendering smoothness, animation performance, and memory usage between Flutter and React Native as of mid 2025.

• Flutter delivers superior performance: cold start ~1.2 s, warm start ~85 ms; 60 fps animations even under load; lower memory usage thanks to Impeller engine and AOT compilation. • React Native improved significantly with Fabric, TurboModules, and Hermes, but still lags slightly in cold start time (~1.6 s) and complex animation handling. Flutter wins in raw performance and resource efficiency on low-end devices. Tags: flutter, react-native, performance, startup-time, ui, memory