Choosing a JavaScript Templating Engine

You’re building a Node.js application—maybe an admin dashboard, a transactional email system, or a lightweight content site. You don’t need React. You just need to render some HTML on the server and send it to the browser. That’s exactly where JavaScript templating engines earn their place.

This article compares the most practical options—EJS, Handlebars, Pug, and Nunjucks—so you can pick the right one for your project without overthinking it.

Templating Engines vs. Frontend Frameworks

Before comparing options, one distinction matters: templating engines and component-based frameworks like React, Vue, or Svelte solve different problems. Frameworks manage interactive UIs in the browser. Templating engines generate HTML on the server and send it down the wire—no client-side JavaScript required.

For server-side rendering in Node.js, static site generation, email templates, or simple content-driven pages, a templating engine is often the cleaner, lighter choice.

EJS vs Handlebars vs Pug: How They Differ

EJS (Embedded JavaScript)

EJS is the most approachable option. Its syntax is plain HTML with <%= %> tags for outputting values and <% %> for logic. If you know HTML and JavaScript, you’re productive immediately.

<h1>Hello, <%= user.name %></h1>
<% if (user.isAdmin) { %>
  <a href="/admin">Dashboard</a>
<% } %>

EJS works well as an Express view engine for prototypes, admin tools, and projects where the team is already comfortable with JavaScript. The tradeoff is that templates can get messy when logic grows—nothing stops you from putting too much JavaScript directly in the view.

Handlebars

Handlebars enforces a stricter separation between logic and presentation. Templates use {{ }} syntax, and anything beyond basic output requires a registered helper function.

<h1>Hello, {{user.name}}</h1>
{{#if user.isAdmin}}
  <a href="/admin">Dashboard</a>
{{/if}}

This constraint is a feature, not a limitation. It keeps templates readable and pushes business logic into JavaScript where it belongs. Handlebars is a strong choice for larger teams, email templates, or any project where non-developers might edit the views. The express-handlebars package integrates cleanly with Express.

Pug Templating

Pug takes a different approach entirely. It drops HTML syntax in favor of indentation-based shorthand—no closing tags, no angle brackets.

h1 Hello #{user.name}
if user.isAdmin
  a(href='/admin') Dashboard

Pug produces concise, readable templates once you adjust to the syntax. It also supports template inheritance natively, which makes it practical for larger view hierarchies. The learning curve is real, though—debugging whitespace errors is frustrating, and designers unfamiliar with the syntax will struggle.

Nunjucks

Nunjucks, developed by Mozilla, is modeled after Jinja2. It supports template inheritance, macros, filters, and async rendering, making it a capable option for structured server-rendered templates and content-heavy sites.

<h1>Hello, {{ user.name }}</h1>
{% if user.isAdmin %}
  <a href="/admin">Dashboard</a>
{% endif %}

Nunjucks is a solid pick for static site generation or content-heavy applications where you need more structure than EJS offers but prefer HTML-like syntax over Pug’s indentation style.

Security: Escaping Output Matters

These engines provide escaped output by default when using their normal output syntax—<%= %> in EJS, {{ }} in Handlebars and Nunjucks. Never use unescaped output tags like <%- %>, {{{ }}}, Pug’s != / !{}, or Nunjucks’ {{ value | safe }} on untrusted user content. Template injection and XSS vulnerabilities are real risks when raw HTML rendering is misused.

Which One Should You Use?

Conclusion

Templating engines aren’t a compromise—they’re the right tool for server-rendered pages, email generation, and lightweight sites where a full frontend framework would add unnecessary complexity. Pick the one whose syntax fits your team’s workflow, keep logic out of your templates, and escape user content consistently. That’s most of what you need to know.

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