> I have been a part of quite a few tech stack decisions at various companies and startups. I have literally never heard an argument made for react that included merits of the framework itself. The decision was always based on a combination for familiarity, ability to hire for eng roles, and the ecosystem.

Couple of thoughts regarding this:

* A competing alternative would have to have really big benefits from a technical standpoint to outweigh the React advantages that you mentioned.

* When exploring alternatives IMO the burden of proving that something is better lies within the person/people that want to go with an alternative option. React is the de facto standard these days so it shouldn't be a matter of "why React" but "why not React".