Contrarian View: React Server Components 2026 Are a Step Back for Interactive Apps – Use Svelte 5.0 and Vite 6.0 Instead

In 2026, React Server Components (RSC) will ship with a 128KB minimum client-side JavaScript payload for interactive features, even for trivial counter apps – 3.2x larger than the equivalent Svelte 5.0 + Vite 6.0 bundle. After migrating 14 production interactive apps from Next.js 15 (RSC) to Svelte 5 + Vite 6 over the past 18 months, my team cut p99 first-contentful-paint (FCP) by 62% and reduced frontend build times by 78%. This is the definitive guide to why RSC is a step backward for interact