> so in that case isn't it a good idea to try and reduce your overheads wherever possible?

I think it's the opposite: if you're using react-native or electron you might as well give up on optimizing the size of your own code, because it's not going to make a dent in your overall level of bloat. Enabling your codebase to be used from the user's own browser would have a much better return in bloat-reduction, even if it meant writing more of your own code.

> And in the case of windows store apps, the runtime is already on the users systems and they're just downloading the packaged JS/HTML

Sure, but making your site windows-store-only is morally the same thing as making it single-browser (possibly even single-version-of-that-browser). The flip side of "all that "bloat" is there so that you'll get consistent results across browsers" is that you can cut a lot of bloat if you're willing to sacrifice crossplatform support.

> Enabling your codebase to be used from the user's own browser would have a much better return in bloat-reduction, even if it meant writing more of your own code.

Not every app can be ported to the browser. For instance, if I wanted to make a local file manager (like fman) I couldn't do that in the browser. This is why native apps exist.

Sure, but even for that kind of app, if you were looking to reduce the bloat then I'd look to try to cut down the runtime you were shipping (i.e. maybe you can build some stripped-down version of electron that contains only the parts you need) before trying to cut your own code, because the runtime is where most of the bloat is.

> maybe you can build some stripped-down version of electron that contains only the parts you need

if you're using electron in the first place, I think its safe to assume that re-inventing electron is not within your skillset.

Build in the sense of "compile" more than in the sense of "write"; I'm not advocating reinventing it from scratch, just customizing it a little.

That would be a neat option, but I don't think its possible at the moment. you have to take all or nothing.

You raise a good point though. If they could make electron more modular it would save on a lot of that bloat everyone always complains about. I bet half the apps could make do without audio, image processing etc