Question 1

What is a shadcn accordion?

Accepted Answer

A shadcn accordion is a collapsible panel component for disclosing chunks of related content behind a clickable header. It's built on Radix UI's Accordion primitive (keyboard navigation, ARIA semantics, focus management) and styled with shadcn/ui + Tailwind CSS, so it drops into any React or Next.js project without additional CSS. Each example in this gallery is a single self-contained TSX file — copy, paste, and ship.

Question 2

Are these accordion examples free?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Every accordion example on shadcn.io is free to copy and use in personal or commercial projects. There's no gated source, no attribution requirement, no runtime dependency on shadcn.io. Browse any example, view the code, run the installer, and move on.

Question 3

How are these different from the raw shadcn/ui Accordion primitive?

Accepted Answer

The primitive gives you Accordion, AccordionItem, AccordionTrigger, and AccordionContent — the atomic building blocks. These examples compose those primitives into complete, opinionated UX patterns: FAQs with plus/minus toggles, nested multi-level accordions, icon-led category lists, tab-style horizontal accordions, and more. You still own the code, but each pattern is a concrete starting point rather than a blank slate.

Question 4

When should I use an accordion instead of tabs, dialogs, or a scroll-revealed list?

Accepted Answer

Reach for an accordion when every section is independently discoverable (users might want several open at once), when content length per section varies widely, or when you want to preserve page context and avoid full-page navigation. Use tabs when only one section is relevant at a time. Use a dialog when the content demands the user's full attention. Use a plain list when the content is scannable at a glance.

Question 5

Which accordion variant should I pick for a FAQ section?

Accepted Answer

For a standard FAQ, start with the plus/minus toggle variant — it's the clearest affordance that "click to expand" and reads well on landing pages. If your questions have sub-categories, use the subtitle variant to put a one-line descriptor under each header. For 20+ questions, the tab-style accordion groups answers into topic tabs so users don't doom-scroll.

Question 6

How do I build a nested or multi-level accordion?

Accepted Answer

Use the multi-level examples in this gallery — they nest a second Accordion inside an AccordionContent, keeping the Radix accessibility semantics intact (focus is managed at each level, aria-expanded propagates correctly). Watch the indent depth: two levels max for most UIs, three if the content is truly hierarchical (e.g. settings trees). Deeper than three and users lose the parent context.

Question 7

What's the difference between single and multiple open items?

Accepted Answer

The Radix Accordion accepts a `type` prop: `type="single"` collapses any other open item when the user opens a new one — best for FAQs and guided flows where one answer at a time is enough. `type="multiple"` lets users open several items simultaneously — use it for settings panels, product specs, or anywhere the sections are genuinely independent and side-by-side comparison is useful.

Question 8

Can I use custom icons instead of the default chevron?

Accepted Answer

Yes — the icon-led examples in this gallery swap the chevron for Lucide React icons (plus/minus toggles, category icons, left-aligned chevrons). The trick is to override the built-in chevron styling: either set the AccordionTrigger chevron invisible and render your own icon inside the trigger, or style the [data-state=open] rotation yourself. Every example here shows a complete pattern you can copy.

Question 9

How do I install an accordion example?

Accepted Answer

Run the `npx shadcn@latest add` command shown under the Installation heading on any example's detail page. The shadcn CLI copies the component's TSX source into your project at `components/examples/accordion/…`, plus any missing shadcn/ui dependencies (the Accordion primitive, utility helpers, etc.). From there it's regular React code — modify it in place, rename it, or reuse it across routes.

Question 10

What React and Next.js versions do these examples support?

Accepted Answer

React 19+ and Next.js 14+ are the baseline. Every example is written for the App Router and marked `"use client"` where client-side state is required (which, for accordions, is most of them — the Radix primitive holds the open/closed state). Pages Router works too, but you may need to strip the `"use client"` directive and adjust import aliases.

Question 11

How do I customize the accordion's open/close animation?

Accepted Answer

The shadcn/ui Accordion uses `data-state="open"` / `data-state="closed"` CSS attributes plus a height-auto transition via Tailwind's `animate-accordion-down` / `animate-accordion-up` utilities. Override either by redefining the keyframes in your `tailwind.config.ts` (or `@keyframes` in global.css for Tailwind v4), or skip the utilities entirely and wrap AccordionContent in a motion/react component with height-auto animation.

Question 12

Can I preload accordion content as it opens?

Accepted Answer

The AccordionContent region is unmounted when closed by default — good for DOM weight but means nothing is ready until the user expands. To preload, set `forceMount` on AccordionContent and hide it with CSS (`[data-state=closed] { display: none }` or similar), so the children render even when collapsed. This is the pattern we use for accordion examples that include charts or iframes that need a head start.

Question 13

Which libraries do accordion examples depend on?

Accepted Answer

Radix UI Accordion (the behaviour primitive), shadcn/ui Accordion (the styled wrapper generated into your project by the CLI), Tailwind CSS (styling), and Lucide React (icons). No accordion-specific state library — state lives inside Radix via `useState`. TypeScript is assumed. React 19 is the baseline. Some examples add motion/react for animation flourishes; those are optional.

Question 14

Are the accordion examples accessible for keyboard and screen reader users?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Radix Accordion implements the WAI-ARIA Accordion pattern out of the box: Tab moves between triggers, Enter/Space toggles expansion, aria-expanded and aria-controls are wired automatically, and the content region has the correct role. Every example in this gallery preserves those semantics — we only override visuals, never the interaction layer. Run axe DevTools on any example and you should see a clean bill.

Question 15

Can I use these accordion examples with React Server Components?

Accepted Answer

The Accordion primitive is a client component because it holds open/closed state. Wrap it inside a Server Component parent and pass the content down via children or props — that's the same pattern you'd use for shadcn Dialog, Popover, etc. Content inside an AccordionContent can be any React tree (Server Components, async Server Components with fetched data, MDX, anything).

Question 16

Do these examples work with Tailwind CSS v3 and v4?

Accepted Answer

Both. shadcn.io is authored on Tailwind v4, so the examples use the v4 class names and design tokens. If you're on Tailwind v3, the classes still apply — Tailwind v4 introduced opt-in features but kept the utility naming compatible. Custom keyframes (the accordion-down/up animations) are declared identically under both versions, just in different config files.

React Accordion Examples for shadcn/ui

Browse every accordion example

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