If you’re planning a new web design project and want your site to be fully-responsive and modern looking, then there’s a good chance you might want to try using either Twitter Bootstrap or the Zurb Foundation. Of course you could be using one of the two yourself already, which is probably making you wonder during some of your more sleepless nights why you aren’t working with the other one? Well, you might be wondering yourself which one is the better front end framework.
Here are some differences between these popular front end frameworks:
UI Elements
Both Bootstrap and Foundation love their UI elements although they take different approaches as to their user interface elements. For Bootstrap, they like their user interface elements extensive. For the Zurb Foundation however, you’re going to have user interfaces elements that are compact and tight. Depending on your preference, you can choose to go with one rather than the other.
Development
Twitter Bootstrap is all about fast and easy programming of your cross platform site, that’s why Twitter Bootstrap uses rapid development prototypes. For Foundation however, you’re going to have to do a lot of the designing yourself. If you want to do a lot of designing then Zurb’s offering is going to be the more attractive one for you. But if you want to do it fast and with quick results, you should choose Twitter Bootstrap. Again, when it comes to this category, it’s more about the preference.
Syntax
If you want to code using, as much as possible, pretty looking and conversation sounding syntax, then you are going to have to choose Foundation over Bootstrap. Foundation’s code looks much more straightforward than Twitter Bootstrap. However, if you want to code with something more succinct, and you don’t mind having to memorize or read code that looks like it’s pirate talk, then Bootstrap is the one for you.
Preprocessor Support
This is where Bootstrap and Foundation really differ. While they may look and function the same in many aspects, their difference in preprocessors really make a big, um, difference. Bootstrap uses LESS (which when you look at it, isn’t really a very convincing name for a preprocessor) while Foundation uses Sass. Sass is a lot more powerful than LESS.
Bootstrap and Foundation are so much alike in so many things that even other web app programmers are also unconvinced whether one is better than the other. One good this with these frameworks is that they are continuously being upgraded. Being the top two frameworks in the web app coding industry means that they really have to deliver the good to get the best share of the market.
At the moment, because they are in a head to head, you will have to decide for yourself which one you are going to use. You can pick according to the look of the developed product, or you could decide to choose according to your choice of preprocessor. The choice is yours. Whichever one you choose however, you’re guaranteed of coming up with great results.