Exploring the New Features in Angular 18

Introduction

Angular 18 has not yet been launched, as of last update in August 2024. Angular releases typically focus on performance improvements, Angular CLI updates, Angular Material additions, and improved developer tooling. You can expect Angular 18 to continue on this path, with features like as:

• Enhanced TypeScript Support:

Angular versions tend to align with new TypeScript versions, so Angular 18 might bring enhanced support for newer TypeScript features.

type User = { id: number; name: string; };
function fetchUser(id: number): User | null {
  // New TypeScript feature or syntax
  return id > 0 ? { id, name: "User" } : null;
}        

• Component-Level Hydration:

Building on Angular’s focus on server-side rendering, we might see finer control over hydration, allowing developers to selectively hydrate parts of the app.

@Component({
  selector: 'app-root',
  template: `<app-header></app-header><app-content></app-content>`
})
export class AppComponent {
  // Improved SSR support with component-level hydration
  constructor() {
    // An Angular 18 feature
  }
}        

• Standalone Components and Directives:

While introduced in Angular 14, there might be enhancements to the standalone API to make Angular applications more modular.

@Component({
  selector: 'app-standalone',
  standalone: true,
  template: `<p>Standalone Component in Angular 18</p>`,
})
export class StandaloneComponent {}        

• Improved Developer Experience (DX):

Angular’s CLI could see improvements in performance, better error messages, and more streamlined workflows.

ng generate component my-component --standalone        

• Faster Builds:

Each version often brings optimizations to build times and bundle sizes, so this might continue in Angular 18.