Node.js made it straightforward to build a lightweight backend for a personal project splitting bills between roommates, without needing heavy infrastructure for something this small in scale. The npm ecosystem gave me quick access to packages for things like scheduling recurring expenses and handling calculations, which sped up development significantly. Performance was more than sufficient for a small user base like a handful of roommates, with fast response times even on modest hosting. Since it's open-source and free, the ROI was excellent for a side project with no budget, and the documentation combined with the large community made onboarding myself into unfamiliar packages quick, without needing paid support. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Callback-heavy code and asynchronous patterns took some getting used to, especially early on before settling into async/await conventions properly. Error handling in asynchronous flows can get messy if not structured carefully, which caused a few subtle bugs when calculating and splitting expenses. Since it's just JavaScript on the backend, there's no built-in intelligence or AI-assisted debugging, so troubleshooting relied entirely on manual tracing and community resources like Stack Overflow rather than any smart assistance from the runtime itself. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.