Any backend devs here working with TypeScript? What are the best framework choices right now? I've been looking at Nest.js, but there seems to be a steep learning curve that might hamper onboarding of my (literally fresh graduate) new hires. There's also Ts.ED, which seems like the fat has been trimmed from it.
I know people will recommend something like, just using express / koa / hapi but I don't think we have the time to work with something super lightweight 😬😬😬. And besides, opinionated frameworks will speed things up for now (we have a lot of crap we want to do this incoming 2022)

Those are pretty much the better options you have. Look into AdonisJS as your third option. It’s been a while since I evaluated a few of these options, and I never tried it, since it didn’t play nicely with MongoDB, that was used as the database solution in the project I evaluated them for, but Nest.js, TS.ed and AdonisJS were the ones I shortlisted. The learning curve isn’t as bad as you think - and especially Nest has a very good documentation.

nest isn’t hard to start and learn as you progress, it’s only hard to master

Majority of TS users here will say use nest, because we're birds of a feather 😄

You can check this out
https://remix.run/

..but I don't think we have the time to work with..

Top 10 pictures taken before disaster.

@hashedram believe me, I know what you're thinking. But some things are just out of my control :P

@oraro you really shouldn’t put fresh graduates in such a time sensitive project, where their first experience will almost certainly be a failure. If I were you, I’d just tell your manager no. Either get more experienced devs or a more lenient schedule.

@100110111 I was exaggerating a bit. I have some existing industry professional hires but I'm having them handle the more mission-critical dev work. The new services we'll be making will be something I'll be pair-programming with the newbies

@oraro why use TS tho?

@100110111 Primarily an arbitrary decision because our existing codebase is already in TS ;) but I suppose it's also the right mix of fast developement + type "safety" (i say this with very big quotes)

Adonis JS if you want battieries included ala. Laravel.
Otherwise Nest..
If you want full stack, checkout blitz.js og remix.run

Do you know express and do you know JS? then Typescript plus express ain't that hard to work around really. What I hate about express is that everyone does their own shit. But you can all bring about more sanity by adding specs to the project. Honestly, the type specifications for what you are building up, copped with ts-node-dev make for a lot of sense for a project that can grow. I don't see a problem with this and making your users learn it.

I have not qualms with NestJS, other than their idea of dependency injection is broken imho, but if you are familiar with Angular it makes sense. My recommendation? TypeScript + Koa/Express with Auth0 and you are gold and off to the races.