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... assuming client side rendering. there are single page server side renders which can provide html-only single page sites.

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What if you need some degree of client-side interactivity? Then you need JavaScript logic in the browser. That is in addition to the tools that perform server-side rendering. Isn’t this added complexity prone to over-engineering, more so than having a single JavaScript framework that renders the site and handles interactivity, all in one place?

I get that client-side rendering can be a problem if JavaScript is disabled or fails to load and execute, but that by itself does not mean that singe-page apps are over-engineered. On the contrary, I’d argue that a single-page app is the simplest (least complex) approach to creating a blog site with some interactivity.

For example, Emweb's WT is an example of a server side renderer which inserts pieces of JavaScript on the client side for some UI enhancements.

With the server side rendering, it is able to detect browsers where javascript has been disabled and then render html-only pages.

So whether it means anything or not, server side rendering can service a wider audience than can client side renderers.

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