React Native Upgrade Checklist for Production Applications

Use this checklist when planning a React Native upgrade that must ship to production — not just compile on a developer laptop.

Pre-upgrade

• Confirm current store versions, crash rates, and top user flows.
• Tag a known-good release branch and document build commands.
• Export dependency tree and list packages with native code.
• Read React Native upgrade helper / release notes for target version.

During upgrade

• Upgrade React and React Native together per official guidance.
• Update Android Gradle, compile SDK, and iOS deployment target as required.
• Run pod install on a clean macOS CI agent where possible.
• Fix breaking changes in navigation, reanimated, screens, and other core libraries.
• Revisit ProGuard / R8 rules and iOS privacy manifests if applicable.

Validation

• Smoke test authentication, payments, push, deep links, and offline flows.
• Test on oldest supported OS versions you still claim to support.
• Compare startup time and critical screen render performance.
• Run staged rollout with monitoring dashboards open.

After release

• Watch crash-free sessions and ANR rates for 48–72 hours.
• Capture lessons for the next upgrade cycle — upgrade little and often where possible.

For hands-on support, see our React Native upgrade consultancy.