# React: Using State Within An Arrow Function Component

When building React applications, my components would consist of a mixture of React Function and Class components. As much as I love to use React Function components due to their simple, lightweight and concise code construction, I had a misconception they were limited in features.

React Function components are generally classed as "stateless" where I would go as far as to send props (if required) and return the rendered output in HTML. So whenever there was a need for some form of interaction where state was required, a Class component would be used.

It was only until recently I was made aware of [React Hooks](https://reactjs.org/docs/hooks-intro.html) that allowed React Function components to have state. Let's take a look at a simple example where we are increasing and decreasing a number.

```
import React, { useState } from 'react';

const CounterApp = () => {
  const [state, setState] = useState({
    count: 0
  });  

  const incrementCount = () => {
    setState({
      count: state.count + 1,
    });
  }

  const decrementCount = () => {
    setState({
      count: state.count - 1,
    });
  }

  return (
    <div>
      <h1>{state.count}</h1>

      <button onClick={incrementCount}>Increment</button>
      <button onClick={decrementCount}>Decrement</button>
    </div>
  );
};

export default CounterApp;
```

In the code above we have accomplished two things:

1) Storing our counter in state.
2) Click handlers

The `useState()` hook declaration accepts properties in the way we are accustomed to when used in a Class component. The similarity doesn't stop there, you'll also notice the same approach when setting and getting a state property.

Multiple states can also be declared and through the array destructuring syntax lets us give different names to the state variables we declared by calling `useState`. Really cool!

```
const [age, setAge] = useState(42);
const [fruit, setFruit] = useState('banana');
const [todos, setTodos] = useState([{ text: 'Learn Hooks' }]);
```

Even though this post has concentrated on state, I've found React Function components offer similar features as a Class component. This is how I will be building my components going forward.