State Management in 2026: Zustand vs Context vs Redux

With React 19 and Server Components handling the vast majority of our data fetching, what happens to global state? Many developers are quick to declare that Redux is overkill. The battle for the standard approach in modern Next.js apps is fundamentally evolving.

When Do You Actually Need Redux in 2026?

Redux Toolkit (RTK) is still exceptionally powerful, but its primary utility has dramatically shifted. If you are building highly complex, deeply interactive web applications like a dense dashboards, a real-time collaborative editor, or a massive e-commerce platform with intricate client-side caching and optimistic UI updates, Redux remains the undisputed king of predictable state container architecture. It excels at complex, cross-domain state where rigorous time-travel debugging and strict unidirectional flow are non-negotiable.

The Real Engineering Perspective: Zustand & Context

However, for 80% of typical applications (landing pages, marketing sites, generic SaaS platforms, and standard portfolios), the massive 'store everything' mentality is a legacy burden. As Boniqx, I highly advocate for combining lightweight Context API for dependency injection and standard theme states, alongside Zustand for external, outside-React updating capabilities. Zustand provides rapid, atomic state slices without the boilerplate of Redux, bridging the gap between complexity and development speed.