Building forms that don't suck
Forms are where most websites fail to convert. The fix is rarely about the framework.
A form is a contract between you and the visitor: I'll give you what you want if you give me what I'm asking for. Most forms violate the contract within three fields.
What kills forms
Asking for everything up front. The brief said "we need their phone number" - fine, ask in the second step, after the visitor has committed to filling something out. First-touch fields should be the absolute minimum.
Generic validation. "Invalid input" is not feedback. "Email needs an @" is feedback. The difference is usability. Inline, polite, specific.
No state. Refreshing the page wipes a 10-minute form. Modern frameworks make persistence trivial - store progress in localStorage, restore on mount, clear on submit.
What we ship by default
Two-step minimum for anything past 4 fields. Inline validation on blur, not on every keystroke. Submit button disabled with a reason ("Add an email"). Focus management that puts the cursor where it should be after every interaction.
Forms aren't a design problem or a framework problem. They're a "do you respect the visitor's time" problem.