Electron and Tauri both build a desktop app from an HTML, CSS and JavaScript interface. What differs is what goes into the installer. Electron embeds Chromium and Node.js in every app. Tauri uses the browser engine the operating system already has, and the system-side logic is written in Rust. According to the Tauri documentation, a minimal app can be under 600 KB.
Tauri and Electron side by side
| Point | Tauri | Electron |
|---|---|---|
| Interface engine | WebView2 on Windows, WKWebView on macOS, WebKitGTK on Linux | Chromium bundled with the app |
| System-side code | Rust | Node.js |
| App updates | every update must be signed, and this cannot be switched off | automatic updates on macOS require a signed app |
| Engine updates | WebView2 updates itself, WebKit comes with the system | a new Chromium reaches users only with a new app release |
Upkeep over the years
Electron ships a new major version every 8 weeks and supports the latest three. An app that should keep receiving Chromium security fixes has to move to a newer Electron roughly every six months. With Tauri, the Windows engine refreshes itself, and the Rust compiler checks the app's code for memory, thread and type safety.
Electron wins when the interface must behave identically on every system, since it runs the same Chromium everywhere, or when a company already has a large Node.js codebase.
What we choose
We build desktop apps for Windows, macOS and Linux from one Rust and Tauri codebase, with offline work, file access and automatic updates. The installer stays small, and every update is signed before it reaches a user.
Scope, platforms and how we quote a desktop app are on our desktop apps page.
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