Shadcn UI - React Components for Modern Applications

Shadcn UI is a collection of beautifully designed, accessible React components built with Radix UI primitives and styled with Tailwind CSS for Next.js applications. Here's what makes it revolutionary—instead of installing a traditional dependency, you copy the actual TypeScript source code directly into your codebase. You own the components completely.

This open source approach solves the React component library problem developers have been quietly suffering through for years.

Your first 5 minutes with shadcn/ui

npx shadcn@latest init

npx shadcn@latest add button

Why developers are obsessed with shadcn/ui

Let me paint you a picture. You're building an app with Material UI or Ant Design. Everything's great until you need to tweak that one component. You know, just move this button here, change that animation, add a feature the library doesn't support. Suddenly you're knee-deep in CSS overrides, fighting specificity wars, and considering whether it's time to just build everything from scratch.

Sound familiar? Yeah, we've all been there.

shadcn/ui flips the entire script. Instead of installing a dependency you'll fight with for the next three years, you copy the component directly into your codebase. Want to completely redesign how the Dialog works? Go ahead. Need to add a feature? The code's right there. It's not magic—it's ownership.

What makes these docs different

This isn't your typical component documentation where we show you props tables and call it a day. We've built something better—a complete guide to mastering every shadcn/ui component with:

Real patterns that ship to production
Every example here comes from actual Next.js and React production applications. No toy demos, no "foo bar" examples. When we show you a Data Table, it's handling real pagination, sorting, and filtering with TypeScript—the stuff you actually need.

The "why" behind the code
Sure, we'll show you how to use a Command palette. But we'll also explain why you'd pick it over a Dropdown Menu, when to use inline vs dialog mode, and how companies like Linear made it feel so damn fast.

Framework flexibility
While the core library started with React, Next.js, and Radix UI, we're documenting TypeScript patterns that work across frameworks. Vue support is landing soon, and the underlying accessibility patterns translate everywhere.

The shadcn/ui philosophy (and why it matters)

There are three big ideas that make shadcn/ui special:

1. Components as building blocks, not black boxes

When Bootstrap ruled the web, every site looked the same. Then came the "customizable" era—Material UI, Chakra, Ant Design—where you could theme React components but not truly own them. shadcn/ui says forget all that. Here's the actual TypeScript code. Make it yours. You're building your own open source component system with battle-tested starting points.

2. Semantic design tokens that just work

Every shadcn/ui component uses the same CSS variables: --primary, --background, --foreground, and friends. This isn't just about consistency—it's about creating an ecosystem where any component from any developer automatically matches your theme.

Copy a component from this site, from GitHub, from that random blog post—if it follows shadcn patterns, it'll look right at home in your app. No configuration, no wrapper components, no theme providers. It just works.

This is why you'll see consistent theming between a Button and Input without any configuration. They both use the same design tokens, so they automatically look like they belong together.

3. Built for the AI era

Let's be real—we're all using Copilot, Cursor, or v0 these days. shadcn/ui React components with TypeScript are structured perfectly for AI tools because:

• The code is readable and follows consistent Next.js patterns
• Everything's in your codebase, giving AI full context for accessibility
• Components compose predictably, making generation reliable

When you prompt "make this dialog slide in from the right," your AI assistant can actually do it because it can see and modify the real implementation.

Why this approach actually works

Here's what happens when you own your components instead of fighting with a library:

Debugging becomes simple. When something breaks, you open the file and fix it. No more digging through node_modules or waiting for library maintainers.

Customization is just coding. Need a loading state? Add it. Want animations? Build them. Your designer wants something specific? The code is right there.

Better bundle sizes. You only ship what you use in your Next.js application. No massive design system for three components. Tree-shaking actually works with TypeScript when you can delete unused code.

Components evolve with your product. That Data Table from two years ago? Modify it for your new features instead of working around library limitations.

The components that started a revolution

Want to explore specific React components with TypeScript? Check out these popular ones for Next.js applications:

Questions you're probably thinking