react-media vs react-responsive
Responsive Design Libraries for React
react-mediareact-responsiveSimilar Packages:

Responsive Design Libraries for React

Responsive design libraries for React facilitate the creation of applications that adapt seamlessly to various screen sizes and devices. These libraries provide tools and components that help developers implement media queries and responsive layouts more efficiently. By leveraging these packages, developers can ensure that their applications deliver an optimal user experience across a wide range of devices, from mobile phones to desktop computers. Both react-media and react-responsive offer unique approaches to handling responsive design, making them valuable tools in a developer's toolkit.

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react-media02,426-86 years agoMIT
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Feature Comparison: react-media vs react-responsive

Media Query Handling

  • react-media:

    react-media provides a simple API for defining media queries and allows you to render components conditionally based on the current viewport size. It supports both CSS media queries and custom breakpoints, making it flexible for various use cases.

  • react-responsive:

    react-responsive offers a more declarative syntax for media queries, allowing you to define breakpoints directly in your JSX. It provides a set of components that automatically adjust rendering based on the screen size, making it easier to manage responsive layouts.

Flexibility and Customization

  • react-media:

    react-media is lightweight and allows for granular control over how components render based on media queries. This flexibility is beneficial for developers who want to implement specific logic for different screen sizes without a lot of overhead.

  • react-responsive:

    react-responsive provides a higher-level abstraction, which can simplify the implementation of responsive designs. It allows for easier management of breakpoints and responsive components, making it suitable for larger applications.

Performance

  • react-media:

    react-media is optimized for performance, as it only re-renders components when the media query conditions change. This minimizes unnecessary renders and improves the overall efficiency of your application.

  • react-responsive:

    react-responsive also focuses on performance, but its higher-level abstraction may introduce some overhead compared to react-media. However, it still maintains good performance by optimizing re-renders based on screen size changes.

Ease of Use

  • react-media:

    react-media has a straightforward API that is easy to understand, making it suitable for developers who prefer a minimalistic approach to responsive design without additional complexity.

  • react-responsive:

    react-responsive's declarative approach can be easier for developers to use, especially those familiar with JSX. It allows for a more intuitive way to implement responsive designs directly within the component structure.

Community and Ecosystem

  • react-media:

    react-media has a smaller community compared to react-responsive, but it is still well-maintained and offers sufficient documentation for developers looking to implement media queries in their applications.

  • react-responsive:

    react-responsive has a larger community and ecosystem, providing more resources, examples, and third-party integrations. This can be beneficial for developers seeking support and additional tools for responsive design.

How to Choose: react-media vs react-responsive

  • react-media:

    Choose react-media if you need a lightweight solution that focuses on media query handling and allows for conditional rendering based on screen size. It is ideal for projects where you want to implement specific components or styles based on the current viewport without a complex setup.

  • react-responsive:

    Choose react-responsive if you prefer a more comprehensive and feature-rich solution that provides a higher-level abstraction for responsive design. It offers a more declarative approach to media queries and includes additional features like responsive images and breakpoints, making it suitable for larger projects that require extensive responsive capabilities.

README for react-media

react-media Travis npm package

react-media is a CSS media query component for React.

A <Media> component listens for matches to a CSS media query and renders stuff based on whether the query matches or not.

Installation

Using npm:

$ npm install --save react-media

Then, use as you would anything else:

// using ES modules
import Media from 'react-media';

// using CommonJS modules
var Media = require('react-media');

The UMD build is also available on unpkg:

<script src="https://unpkg.com/react-media"></script>

You can find the library on window.ReactMedia.

Basic usage

queries

Render a <Media> component with a queries prop whose value is an object, where each value is a valid CSS media query. The children prop should be a function whose argument will be an object with the same keys as your queries object, and whose values are booleans indicating whether each query matches.

import React, { Fragment } from 'react';
import Media from 'react-media';

class App extends React.Component {
  render() {
    return (
      <div>
        <Media queries={{
          small: "(max-width: 599px)",
          medium: "(min-width: 600px) and (max-width: 1199px)",
          large: "(min-width: 1200px)"
        }}>
          {matches => (
            <Fragment>
              {matches.small && <p>I am small!</p>}
              {matches.medium && <p>I am medium!</p>}
              {matches.large && <p>I am large!</p>}
            </Fragment>
          )}
        </Media>
      </div>
    );
  }
}

query

Alternatively, if you only need to match against a single media query, the query prop provides a less-verbose approach. More documentation about the difference betwen query and queries can be found below.

import React, { Fragment } from 'react';
import Media from 'react-media';

class App extends React.Component {
  render() {
    return (
      <div>
        <Media query="(max-width: 599px)" render={() =>
          (
            <p>I am small!</p>
          )}
        />
      </div>
    );
  }
}

query vs queries

The queries prop was added to allow for multiple media queries to be matched without excessive nesting or other workarounds. The query prop was retained out of recognition that a single query covers many use cases, and there is already a lot of usage that would be a pain to migrate.

The salient points:

  • You cannot use them together: if you do, the component will throw an error. This is to avoid confusion around precedence.
  • The render methods differ slightly: for the queries prop, the render and child JSX methods will render if at least one of the given queries is matched. The query prop renders if the given query matches.

queries

In addition to passing a valid media query string, the queries prop will also accept an object of objects whose forms are similar to React's built-in support for inline style objects in e.g. <div style>. These objects are converted to CSS media queries via json2mq.

import React from 'react';
import Media from 'react-media';

class App extends React.Component {
  render() {
    return (
      <div>
        <h1>These two Media components are equivalent</h1>

        <Media queries={{ small: { maxWidth: 599 } }}>
          {matches =>
            matches.small ? (
              <p>The document is less than 600px wide.</p>
            ) : (
              <p>The document is at least 600px wide.</p>
            )
          }
        </Media>

        <Media queries={{ small: "(max-width: 599px)" }}>
          {matches =>
            matches.small ? (
              <p>The document is less than 600px wide.</p>
            ) : (
              <p>The document is at least 600px wide.</p>
            )
          }
        </Media>
      </div>
    );
  }
}

Keys of media query objects are camel-cased and numeric values automatically get the px suffix. See the json2mq docs for more examples of queries you can construct using objects.

Render props

There are three props which allow you to render your content. They each serve a subtly different purpose.

propdescriptionexample
renderOnly invoked when at least one of the queries matches. This is a nice shorthand if you only want to render something for a matching query.<Media queries={{ foo: ... }} render={() => <p>I matched!</p>} />
children (function)Receives an object of booleans whose keys are the same as the queries prop, indicating whether each media query matched. Use this prop if you need to render different output for each of specified queries.<Media queries={{ foo: ... }}>{matches => matches.foo ? <p>I matched!</p> : <p>I didn't match</p>}</Media>
children (react element)If you render a regular React element within <Media>, it will render that element when at least one of the queries matches. This method serves the same purpose as the render prop, however, you'll create component instances regardless of whether the queries match or not. Hence, using the render prop is preferred (more info).<Media queries={{ ... }}><p>I matched!</p></Media>

query

In addition to passing a valid media query string, the query prop will also accept an object, similar to React's built-in support for inline style objects in e.g. <div style>. These objects are converted to CSS media queries via json2mq.

import React from 'react';
import Media from 'react-media';

class App extends React.Component {
  render() {
    return (
      <div>
        <h1>These two Media components are equivalent</h1>

        <Media query={{ maxWidth: 599 }}>
          {matches =>
            matches ? (
              <p>The document is less than 600px wide.</p>
            ) : (
              <p>The document is at least 600px wide.</p>
            )
          }
        </Media>

        <Media query="(max-width: 599px)">
          {matches =>
            matches ? (
              <p>The document is less than 600px wide.</p>
            ) : (
              <p>The document is at least 600px wide.</p>
            )
          }
        </Media>
      </div>
    );
  }
}

Keys of media query objects are camel-cased and numeric values automatically get the px suffix. See the json2mq docs for more examples of queries you can construct using objects.

Render props

There are three props which allow you to render your content. They each serve a subtly different purpose.

propdescriptionexample
renderOnly invoked when the query matches. This is a nice shorthand if you only want to render something for a matching query.<Media query="..." render={() => <p>I matched!</p>} />
children (function)Receives a single boolean element, indicating whether the media query matched. Use this prop if you need to render something when the query doesn't match.<Media query="...">{matches => matches ? <p>I matched!</p> : <p>I didn't match</p>}</Media>
children (react element)If you render a regular React element within <Media>, it will render that element when the query matches. This method serves the same purpose as the render prop, however, you'll create component instances regardless of whether the query matches or not. Hence, using the render prop is preferred (more info).<Media query="..."><p>I matched!</p></Media>

onChange

You can specify an optional onChange prop, which is a callback function that will be invoked when the status of the media queries changes. This can be useful for triggering side effects, independent of the render lifecycle.

import React from 'react';
import Media from 'react-media';

class App extends React.Component {
  render() {
    return (
      <div>
        <Media
          query={{ small: "(max-width: 599px)" }}
          onChange={matches =>
            matches.small
              ? alert('The document is less than 600px wide.')
              : alert('The document is at least 600px wide.')
          }
        />
      </div>
    );
  }
}

Server-side rendering (SSR)

If you render a <Media> component on the server, it will match by default. You can override the default behavior by setting the defaultMatches prop.

When rendering on the server you can use the defaultMatches prop to set the initial state on the server to match whatever you think it will be on the client. You can detect the user's device by analyzing the user-agent string from the HTTP request in your server-side rendering code.

initialState = {
  device: 'mobile' // add your own guessing logic here, based on user-agent for example
};

<div>
  <Media
    queries={{ medium: "(max-width: 500px)" }}
    defaultMatches={{ medium: state.device === 'mobile' }}
    render={() => <Text>Render me below medium breakpoint.</Text>}
  />

  <Media
    queries={{ medium: "(min-width: 501px)" }}
    defaultMatches={{ medium: state.device === 'desktop' }}
    render={() => <Text>Render me above medium breakpoint.</Text>}
  />
</div>;

targetWindow

An optional targetWindow prop can be specified if you want the queries to be evaluated against a different window object than the one the code is running in. This can be useful if you are rendering part of your component tree to an iframe or a popup window. See this PR thread for context.

About

react-media is developed and maintained by React Training. If you're interested in learning more about what React can do for your company, please get in touch!