Server Components do not need to be hydrated — and in fact, they aren’t.

The only JavaScript sent to the client related to them is the payload, which contains:

• The Server Components tree

• References to Client Component files

The key point is: rehydration requires something to hydrate. Server Components don’t have event handlers, so there’s nothing for hydration to attach.

In other words, the reason Server Components appear in the payload is precisely because they shouldn’t be hydrated.

Hydration is the process of linking event handlers to DOM elements in order to make the page interactive. Since Server Components never contain event handlers, they don’t require hydration.