When comparing JQuery vs Inferno, the Slant community recommends Inferno for most people. In the question“What are the best JavaScript libraries for building a UI?” Inferno is ranked 15th while JQuery is ranked 18th. The most important reason people chose Inferno is:
Use it however you want in a framework of your own custom design. When things change in the industry, swap things out instead of being locked in by someone else's design.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Easy to use
Much easier to use than traditional JavaScript. Allows a lot of features and function to be completed with less lines of code.
Pro Cross-browser support
jQuery works on all modern browsers, although there may be some issues with old versions of each browser.
Pro Strong community
The open source community has really embraced jQuery and it has many readily available plugins to help speed up the development process. In addition to this, it has great documentation and tutorials
Pro Modular
Use it however you want in a framework of your own custom design. When things change in the industry, swap things out instead of being locked in by someone else's design.
Pro Pretty light-weight
Inferno weighs in at 9kb gzipped, which is light-weight.
Pro Fast performance
Inferno is one of the fastest UI libraries around and widely considered the fastest.
Pro React compatability
Using the Inferno compatibility package ("inferno-compat"), Inferno can support the vast majority of React codebases.
Cons
Con It is not a framework, but rather a library.
Frameworks allow you to handle page routing, authentication, and services. jQuery is not a framework, but rather a library of DOM tools for websites.
e.g.: You cannot write page routing logic within jQuery.
Con Script download
As opposed to just using raw JavaScript, users will (automatically) download the jQuery script to their local computers in order for it to work. This results in more overhead on the initial page visit, regardless of how lightweight the framework is.
Con Some React components may not work with Inferno
Inferno and React have different public and private APIs. If 3rd party components use a private API then it's almost certainly going to break when you use it with Inferno.
Once React Fiber is implemented, even libraries that are currently working will break and will not be supported by Inferno.
Con Not very popular
Which can hinder one's opinion of its future, but the future of all "frameworks" is to break things into smaller pieces, so inferno very well might get used by the big names in the future.