Implementing Angular Universal in Your Existing Angular Application

If you are an Angular developer, you know how important it is to create fast and scalable web applications. One way to achieve this is by implementing Angular Universal into your existing Angular application. This article will explain what Angular Universal is, its benefits, and how to implement it into your existing Angular application.

What is Angular Universal?

Angular Universal is a server-side rendering (SSR) solution for Angular. It allows you to generate static HTML on the server and send it to the client-side for rendering. This is different from client-side rendering, where the browser processes the JavaScript and builds the page after the initial load.

With Angular Universal, the initial HTML payload has all the necessary content to make the application visible to the user, which significantly improves the load time of the webpage. This feature is particularly important for search engine optimization (SEO) because search engines prefer fast-loading pages.

Angular Universal also provides better performance on low-network connections, which is essential for users who are browsing the web from mobile devices or in areas with poor internet connectivity.

The benefits of using Angular Universal

Angular Universal offers several benefits, including:

• Improved performance: By rendering the content on the server, the page load time is faster, resulting in a better user experience.
• Better SEO: Angular Universal generates static HTML, which is better for SEO because it’s easier for search engines to crawl and index it.
• Better user experience: Since the initial page is already loaded on the server-side, users get to see the content faster, which improves their experience.
• Progressive Web Application (PWA) compatibility: Angular Universal supports the Service Worker API, which is required for building PWAs.

What do you need to implement Angular Universal?

To implement Angular Universal, you need to have the following:

• Node.js with npm: Angular Universal is based on Node.js, so you need to install it on your machine. You can download Node.js from the official website (https://nodejs.org/).
• Angular CLI: You need the Angular CLI to generate and manage your Angular application. You can install it by running npm install -g @angular/cli in your command prompt.
• Angular Universal package: You can add the Angular Universal package to your existing Angular application by running ng add @nguniversal/express-engine.

How to implement Angular Universal in your existing Angular application?

Implementing Angular Universal in your existing Angular application is not difficult. You can follow these steps:

Step 1: Create an Angular application

If you don’t already have an Angular application, you need to create one. You can create an Angular application by running ng new my-app in your command prompt. This command will generate a new Angular application with a default configuration.

Step 2: Add Angular Universal package

After you have created an Angular application, you need to add the Angular Universal package to it. You can do this by running ng add @nguniversal/express-engine in your command prompt. This command will add the Angular Universal package and its dependencies to your existing Angular application.

Step 3: Generate server files

After you have added the Angular Universal package to your application, you need to generate the server files. You can do this by running ng generate universal my-app in your command prompt. This command will generate the necessary files for Angular Universal.

Step 4: Build your application

Once you have generated the server files, you need to build your application. You can do this by running npm run build:ssr in your command prompt. This command will build your application with Angular Universal.

Step 5: Serve your application

After you have built your application with Angular Universal, you need to serve it. You can do this by running npm run serve:ssr in your command prompt. This command will start your application on the server side.

Conclusion

In conclusion, implementing Angular Universal in your existing Angular application can greatly improve its performance by rendering the content on the server-side, resulting in faster load times, better SEO, and an improved user experience.

With Angular Universal, you can take advantage of server-side rendering and provide a better user experience to your users. Follow the steps above, and you will be on your way to implementing Angular Universal in your existing Angular application.