Introduction to Next.js SSG

Next.js provides a build-time optimization called Static Site Generation (SSG) that generates static HTML files for each page during the build process. These static files can be served directly from a content delivery network (CDN), resulting in dramatically faster load times and better performance.

Setting Up Next.js SSG

To get started with Next.js SSG, follow these steps:

• Create a new Next.js project:

npx create-next-app my-app

• Configure a page to be rendered statically. For example, create a file called index.js in the pages directory with the following code:

// pages/index.js
export default function Home() {
  return <div>Welcome to my static website!</div>;
}

• Build the static site by running the following command:

npm run build && npm run export

• The static site will be generated inside the out directory. You can deploy these files to any static file hosting service or CDN of your choice.

Dynamic Content with Next.js SSG

Next.js SSG also provides the ability to generate dynamic content during the build process. This is done by using the getStaticProps function on your pages.

For example, let's create a dynamic page that fetches data from an API during the build process. Create a file called blog.js in the pages directory with the following code:

// pages/blog.js
export default function Blog({ posts }) {
  return (
    <div>
      <h1>Blog Posts</h1>
      <ul>
        {posts.map((post) => (
          <li key={post.id}>{post.title}</li>
        ))}
      </ul>
    </div>
  );
}

export async function getStaticProps() {
  const response = await fetch('https://api.example.com/posts');
  const posts = await response.json();

  return {
    props: {
      posts,
    },
  };
}

In the above example, the getStaticProps function fetches data from an API and passes it as props to the Blog component. During the build process, this data will be fetched and used to generate the static HTML for this page.

Advantages of Next.js SSG

Next.js SSG offers several benefits for building lightning-fast static websites:

1. Improved Performance: Static websites generated with Next.js SSG can be served from a CDN, resulting in faster load times and improved performance.

2. Better SEO: Search engines can easily crawl and index static websites, leading to better search engine optimization (SEO) and higher rankings.

3. Reduced Server Load: With Next.js SSG, the server load is significantly reduced as the pages are pre-generated during the build process. This allows for handling higher traffic with fewer resources.

Conclusion

Next.js SSG is a powerful feature that allows us to build high-performance static websites with ease. By leveraging the build-time optimizations provided by Next.js, we can achieve incredibly fast load times and improved user experiences.