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I've been building out a fairly complex app. I decided to avoid Next.js some I went with a simple Hono + Tanstack Router/query. With Vite 8, my build time is about ~0.8s. I've also go a much simpler Next.js app with a build time of 45s.
I do love the idea of a batteries included framework for the JS ecosystem, like the mythical Rails for node, but as long as we're gluing random stuff together... This is a really nice combo. I also love using Hono and React/Vite with TRPC.
I stopped working with Next a few years ago, so I can't comment very fairly on recent changes in the framework. However, it does appear as though it has become even more complex, and that was a significant art of what steered me away. The other part was simply a lack of cohesion with design decisions and direction. The middleware layer seemed like a poor design. Various opinions around things like default cache policies felt incorrect. I found myself battling their decisions too often, for too little benefit.