ReactJS - How to maintain stable references for array props to avoid unnecessary re-renders?
Does anyone know how to I've been struggling with this for a few days now and could really use some help. I'm encountering an issue where my child components are re-rendering more frequently than expected when I pass an array as a prop. I'm using React 18 and functional components with hooks. The child component depends heavily on a large array of objects, and every time the parent re-renders, it seems that the child is also re-rendering due to React thinking the props have changed. I've tried using `useMemo` in the parent to memoize the array, but it doesn’t seem to help, likely because I'm creating a new array each time I update the state in the parent component. Here's a simplified version of what I have: ```javascript const Parent = () => { const [items, setItems] = useState([1, 2, 3]); const addItem = () => { setItems([...items, items.length + 1]); // This creates a new array }; return ( <div> <button onClick={addItem}>Add Item</button> <Child items={items} /> </div> ); }; const Child = React.memo(({ items }) => { console.log('Child rendered'); return <div>{items.join(', ')}</div>; }); ``` In the code above, every time I add an item, the `Child` component logs 'Child rendered', indicating it's re-rendering. I tried `useCallback` for the `addItem` function, but that's not the issue since the re-renders are tied to the `items` array prop. Is there a recommended pattern for handling array props in a way that minimizes unnecessary re-renders in child components? I'm also using `React.memo` for the `Child` component, but it doesn’t seem to be effective in this case. How can I ensure that the reference to the array doesn't change unless it really needs to? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated! Any help would be greatly appreciated! My team is using Javascript for this service.