draft-js vs slate
Rich Text Editors for React
draft-jsslateSimilar Packages:

Rich Text Editors for React

Draft.js and Slate are both libraries designed for building rich text editors in React applications. They provide developers with the tools to create customizable and interactive text editing experiences. Draft.js, developed by Facebook, is focused on providing a straightforward API for building rich text editors with a focus on performance and extensibility. Slate, on the other hand, offers a more flexible architecture that allows developers to define their own data structures and behaviors, making it suitable for complex editing scenarios. Both libraries aim to simplify the process of creating rich text editors but differ significantly in their design philosophies and use cases.

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draft-js022,718-9546 years agoMIT
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Feature Comparison: draft-js vs slate

Architecture

  • draft-js:

    Draft.js uses an immutable data structure to represent the editor state, which allows for efficient updates and rendering. It provides a higher-level API that abstracts away many complexities of building a rich text editor, making it easier to implement standard features like text formatting and block types.

  • slate:

    Slate is built around a flexible and customizable architecture that allows developers to define their own data models and behaviors. It uses a plugin-based system that enables the addition of custom features and functionality, making it highly adaptable to various editing needs.

Customization

  • draft-js:

    Draft.js offers a set of built-in features for text styling, block types, and entity management, but it may require more effort to implement highly customized behaviors. While it allows for some level of customization, it is generally more opinionated in its approach.

  • slate:

    Slate excels in customization, allowing developers to create unique editing experiences by defining their own rendering logic and data structures. This flexibility enables the creation of specialized features like collaborative editing, custom formatting, and more complex interactions.

Learning Curve

  • draft-js:

    Draft.js has a moderate learning curve, especially for developers familiar with React. Its API is relatively straightforward, but understanding the underlying concepts of immutable data and editor state management may take some time for new users.

  • slate:

    Slate has a steeper learning curve due to its highly customizable nature and the need to understand its plugin architecture. Developers may need to invest more time in learning how to effectively leverage its capabilities, especially for complex use cases.

Community and Ecosystem

  • draft-js:

    Draft.js benefits from a strong community and backing from Facebook, which provides a wealth of resources, documentation, and examples. However, its ecosystem is more limited compared to Slate when it comes to third-party plugins and extensions.

  • slate:

    Slate has a growing community and a more extensive ecosystem of plugins and extensions, allowing developers to easily integrate additional functionalities. The community-driven nature of Slate encourages collaboration and sharing of custom solutions.

Performance

  • draft-js:

    Draft.js is optimized for performance, particularly in handling large documents and frequent updates. Its use of immutable data structures helps minimize unnecessary re-renders and improves overall responsiveness.

  • slate:

    Slate's performance can vary depending on how it is implemented, as its flexibility allows for a wide range of configurations. Developers need to be mindful of performance implications when creating complex editing experiences, especially with large documents.

How to Choose: draft-js vs slate

  • draft-js:

    Choose Draft.js if you need a straightforward solution with a focus on performance and a solid set of built-in features. It is ideal for applications that require a rich text editor with basic functionalities and where you want to leverage Facebook's ecosystem.

  • slate:

    Choose Slate if you need a highly customizable and extensible rich text editor. It is better suited for complex use cases where you want to define your own data model and behavior, allowing for more intricate editing experiences.

README for draft-js

draftjs-logo

Draft.js

Build Status npm version

Live Demo


Draft.js is a JavaScript rich text editor framework, built for React and backed by an immutable model.

  • Extensible and Customizable: We provide the building blocks to enable the creation of a broad variety of rich text composition experiences, from basic text styles to embedded media.
  • Declarative Rich Text: Draft.js fits seamlessly into React applications, abstracting away the details of rendering, selection, and input behavior with a familiar declarative API.
  • Immutable Editor State: The Draft.js model is built with immutable-js, offering an API with functional state updates and aggressively leveraging data persistence for scalable memory usage.

Learn how to use Draft.js in your own project.

API Notice

Before getting started, please be aware that we recently changed the API of Entity storage in Draft. The latest version, v0.10.0, supports both the old and new API. Following that up will be v0.11.0 which will remove the old API. If you are interested in helping out, or tracking the progress, please follow issue 839.

Getting Started

npm install --save draft-js react react-dom

or

yarn add draft-js react react-dom

Draft.js depends on React and React DOM which must also be installed.

Using Draft.js

import React from 'react';
import ReactDOM from 'react-dom';
import {Editor, EditorState} from 'draft-js';

class MyEditor extends React.Component {
  constructor(props) {
    super(props);
    this.state = {editorState: EditorState.createEmpty()};
    this.onChange = (editorState) => this.setState({editorState});
    this.setEditor = (editor) => {
      this.editor = editor;
    };
    this.focusEditor = () => {
      if (this.editor) {
        this.editor.focus();
      }
    };
  }

  componentDidMount() {
    this.focusEditor();
  }

  render() {
    return (
      <div style={styles.editor} onClick={this.focusEditor}>
        <Editor
          ref={this.setEditor}
          editorState={this.state.editorState}
          onChange={this.onChange}
        />
      </div>
    );
  }
}

const styles = {
  editor: {
    border: '1px solid gray',
    minHeight: '6em'
  }
};

ReactDOM.render(
  <MyEditor />,
  document.getElementById('container')
);

Since the release of React 16.8, you can use Hooks as a way to work with EditorState without using a class.

import React from 'react';
import ReactDOM from 'react-dom';
import {Editor, EditorState} from 'draft-js';

function MyEditor() {
  const [editorState, setEditorState] = React.useState(
    EditorState.createEmpty()
  );

  const editor = React.useRef(null);

  function focusEditor() {
    editor.current.focus();
  }

  React.useEffect(() => {
    focusEditor()
  }, []);

  return (
    <div onClick={focusEditor}>
      <Editor
        ref={editor}
        editorState={editorState}
        onChange={editorState => setEditorState(editorState)}
      />
    </div>
  );
}

Note that the editor itself is only as tall as its contents. In order to give users a visual cue, we recommend setting a border and a minimum height via the .DraftEditor-root CSS selector, or using a wrapper div like in the above example.

Because Draft.js supports unicode, you must have the following meta tag in the <head> </head> block of your HTML file:

<meta charset="utf-8" />

Further examples of how Draft.js can be used are provided below.

Examples

Visit http://draftjs.org/ to try out a basic rich editor example.

The repository includes a variety of different editor examples to demonstrate some of the features offered by the framework.

To run the examples, first build Draft.js locally. The Draft.js build is tested with Yarn v1 only. If you're using any other package manager and something doesn't work, try using yarn v1:

git clone https://github.com/facebook/draft-js.git
cd draft-js
yarn install
yarn run build

then open the example HTML files in your browser.

Draft.js is used in production on Facebook, including status and comment inputs, Notes, and messenger.com.

Browser Support

IE / Edge
IE / Edge
Firefox
Firefox
Chrome
Chrome
Safari
Safari
iOS Safari
iOS Safari
Chrome for Android
Chrome for Android
IE11, Edge [1, 2]last 2 versionslast 2 versionslast 2 versionsnot fully supported [3]not fully supported [3]

[1] May need a shim or a polyfill for some syntax used in Draft.js (docs).

[2] IME inputs have known issues in these browsers, especially Korean (docs).

[3] There are known issues with mobile browsers, especially on Android (docs).

Resources and Ecosystem

Check out this curated list of articles and open-sourced projects/utilities: Awesome Draft-JS.

Discussion and Support

Join our Slack team!

Contribute

We actively welcome pull requests. Learn how to contribute.

License

Draft.js is MIT licensed.

Examples provided in this repository and in the documentation are separately licensed.