> The fundamental difference is what you have in the end. With JSX you have function calls

Check out the output of the Babel plugin mentioned in the readme

> // input:

> html`<div id="foo">hello ${you}</div>`

> // output:

> React.createElement("div", { id: "foo" }, "hello ", you) options

https://www.npmjs.com/package/babel-plugin-htm

It's (marginally) better than having it at runtime. Poor man's macros. Much like JSX in a sense, though JSX is a much thinner abstraction IMO.

and i think this is the point; runtime vs compile time! similar reasons that people love the popular new type systems... if it compiles, it probably works or you get an error rather than pushing that later and possibly not catching it