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Add to SafariWhen comparing Rework vs PostCSS, the Slant community recommends PostCSS for most people. In the question“What are the best CSS preprocessors/postprocessors?” PostCSS is ranked 4th while Rework is ranked 6th. The most important reason people chose PostCSS is:
PostCSS is 3-30 times faster than Sass (including libsass), Less, and Stylus
Question Ranking
Pros
Pro Extend native properties
Through transforms you can modify existing properties to give them new attributes and options, so instead of managing messy mixins, you can add a simple new attribute where they make the most sense.
Pro Unrestricted potential
Because Rework plugins are done in code, there are no limits to what they can do, and they tend to provide more advanced functionality that would be harder to implement in other preprocessors, such as file I/O and custom logic.
Pro Built around plugins
Rework isn't a language for compiling to CSS but rather a library around parsing it and transforming it. For example, a vendor prefix plugin will inject prefixes around needed properties so you don't have to muddy up your CSS dealing with it.
Because Rework is built around plugins at its core, it makes for easier plugin writing if you find you want to add in new functionality.
Pro Can work with other preprocessors
Although you don't have to, since Rework works on vanilla CSS, you could use another preprocessor that has a syntax you enjoy more before applying Rework's transforms.
Pro Allows for customized properties
Rework plugins can recognize custom properties and transform them via plugins. This allows you to keep your CSS clean and expand its functionality in a native feeling way, without having to learn a bunch of new language constructs.
Pro Fast
PostCSS is 3-30 times faster than Sass (including libsass), Less, and Stylus
Pro Flexible
PostCSS allows you to opt-in to the features you need with plugins. This allows you to set it up to behave exactly like Sass, with nesting, mixing, extends, and more. On the other hand, it allows you to use plugins by themselves for things like auto-prefixing, minification, and more. You can even set up your own custom "stack" of plugins to do exactly what you like.
Pro Doesn't force designers to learn a new syntax
Rather than learn a different syntax, PostCSS allows you to write in pure CSS.
Pro JavaScript-based out of the box
Since it's basically CSS extended through JavaScript it works in the browser directly without the need to compile it beforehand.
Cons
Con Replaced by PostCSS
Rework basically solves the same problem as the more popular PostCSS.
Con Difficult for beginners
Rework has a more involved setup that can make it an intimidating first option for beginners to css processing. As Rework is built around plugins, the documentation can't be found in one spot. The quality of documentation also varies between plugins.
Con Harder to install and keep working
The immense flexibility of PostCSS plus its current rapid evolution makes it harder to install, configure and keep running than the more monolithic and mature preprocessors.
Con Outdatet, plugins are often based on different postcss versions and don't work together properly
Con Some plugins need to run in a certain order
Some plugins can only work if initialized after some other plugins. For example, transforming and applying CSS variables needs to run before running a plugin which uses these variables inside conditional transformations.
