React useFetch hook

React, Hooks, Effect, State · May 1, 2022

Implements fetch() in a declarative manner.

  • Create a custom hook that takes a url and options.
  • Use the useState() hook to initialize the response, error and abort state variables.
  • Use the useEffect() hook to asynchronously call fetch() and update the state variables accordingly.
  • Create and use an AbortController to allow aborting the request. Use it to cancel the request when the component unmounts.
  • Return an object containing the response, error and abort state variables.
const useFetch = (url, options) => {
  const [response, setResponse] = React.useState(null);
  const [error, setError] = React.useState(null);
  const [abort, setAbort] = React.useState(() => {});

  React.useEffect(() => {
    const fetchData = async () => {
      try {
        const abortController = new AbortController();
        const signal = abortController.signal;
        setAbort(abortController.abort);
        const res = await fetch(url, {...options, signal});
        const json = await res.json();
        setResponse(json);
      } catch (error) {
        setError(error);
      }
    };
    fetchData();
    return () => {
      abort();
    }
  }, []);

  return { response, error, abort };
};
const ImageFetch = props => {
  const res = useFetch('https://dog.ceo/api/breeds/image/random', {});
  if (!res.response) {
    return <div>Loading...</div>;
  }
  const imageUrl = res.response.message;
  return (
    <div>
      <img src={imageUrl} alt="avatar" width={400} height="auto" />
    </div>
  );
};

ReactDOM.createRoot(document.getElementById('root')).render(
  <ImageFetch />
);

Written by Angelos Chalaris

I'm Angelos Chalaris, a JavaScript software engineer, based in Athens, Greece. The best snippets from my coding adventures are published here to help others learn to code.

If you want to keep in touch, follow me on GitHub.

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