Overview

Angular, operates on the principle of a component-based architecture. Each component has its own life cycle, a sequence of phases during which it is created, rendered, and eventually destroyed. In this comprehensive guide, we will delve deep into the Angular component lifecycle, exploring each phase in detail and understanding the purpose and significance of various lifecycle hooks.

Angular Component Lifecycle

Angular components go through a series of stages during their lifetime. Understanding this lifecycle is essential for developing efficient, responsive, and well-structured applications. The Angular component lifecycle can be broken down into the following phases:

Creation

This is the initial phase when Angular creates the component and calls its constructor. During this phase, the component is not yet initialized.

Initialization

After creation, Angular initializes the component and sets the input properties, which can be configured by the parent component. The constructor, however, is not suitable for accessing these properties.

Content Projection

If the component contains projected content or transcluded content, this is the phase where the content is projected into the component. This allows for flexible and dynamic content rendering.

Change Detection

Angular performs change detections, checking for changes in data bindings. If any changes are detected, the view is updated to reflect these changes.

AfterViewInit

This phase is crucial for components that need to interact with the DOM. It occurs after the component's view and child views are initialized, making it an appropriate time to work with the DOM elements.

Content Checked

Angular checks the projected content, ensuring it is correctly transcluded into the component.

Content Init

In this phase, the projected content is initialized. This is essential when dealing with dynamically generated content.

Destroy

The final phase occurs when the component is destroyed, typically triggered by navigating to a different route or closing the application. This is the time to perform cleanup tasks and release resources.