throw or return Error Response from loaders?

[alicerocheman]

Hi,

I'm currently working on an app with react-router v7 as a framework.

So far, my loaders check the validity of certain routes, and throw a 404 Response if the route makes no sense, or return a redirect.
I've done this because I've seen examples with throwing.
I have not found anything about this in the docs (maybe it should be added there)

I'm wondering whether throwing the 404 response is a good practice, or if it should just be returned.

I've tried both quickly and have not seen a difference on the user end

There is a difference in testing complexity, which would be much simpler if i simply returned responses instead of throwing, which I'm struggling with now, trying to test a complex loader.

[gustavopch]

Throwing doesn't affect the return type of the function in TS, so the type of loaderData/actionData in the component is simpler, which is why I prefer to throw anything that's not meant to be handled by the component.