Infinite Red's Expo SDK 54: Better. Faster. Simpler.
Original post Expo SDK 54: Better. Faster. Simpler.
Article Summary
Frank Calise from Infinite Red tested Expo SDK 54 and found iOS builds dropping from 5:28 to 3:33. That's a 35% time savings without changing a single line of code.
Expo SDK 54 ships with two major developer experience improvements: precompiled React Native binaries for iOS and smarter autolinking for dependencies. The Infinite Red team upgraded multiple production projects to test real-world impact and document the gotchas.
Key Takeaways
- Precompiled React Native for iOS cuts build times by 35% in tested projects
- React Native modules now autolink transitively like Expo modules always have
- Faster builds mean cooler laptops, longer battery life, and cheaper CI bills
- Upgrade is smooth but watch for react-native-mmkv and Zeego dependency issues
Expo SDK 54 delivers immediate workflow wins through precompiled binaries and smarter dependency management, with build time reductions of 20-35% across different project sizes.
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Jan 28, 2026
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What This Article Covers
React Native libraries required developers to manually install peer dependencies. You had to dig through README files to find hidden setup steps, like installing react-native-reanimated and react-native-gesture-handler on your own.
Expo SDK 54 added transitive autolinking for React Native modules, using the same approach Expo modules already had. Now libraries can manage their own dependency chains without manual intervention.
Developers spend less time on manual installs and get more predictable dependency resolution. This works better in monorepos and with package managers like pnpm or Bun, so you don't need to read through confusing multi-step setup docs.
This page summarizes “Expo SDK 54: Better. Faster. Simpler.” by Infinite Red, published Sep 8, 2025. All credit for the original work goes to the authors.
