tailwind-variants

The power of Tailwind combined with a first-class variant API.

Features

• First-class variant API
• Slots support
• Composition support
• Fully typed
• Framework agnostic
• Automatic conflict resolution
• Tailwindcss V4 support

Documentation

For full documentation, visit tailwind-variants.org

❕ Note: Tailwindcss V4 no longer supports the config.content.transform so we remove the responsive variants feature

If you want to use responsive variants, you need to add it manually to your classname.

Quick Start

1. Installation: To use Tailwind Variants in your project, you can install it as a dependency:

yarn add tailwind-variants
# or
npm i tailwind-variants
# or
pnpm add tailwind-variants

Optional: If you want automatic conflict resolution, also install tailwind-merge:

yarn add tailwind-merge
# or
npm i tailwind-merge
# or
pnpm add tailwind-merge

⚠️ Compatibility Note: Supports Tailwind CSS v4.x (requires tailwind-merge v3.x). If you use Tailwind CSS v3.x, use tailwind-variants v0.x with tailwind-merge v2.6.0.

💡 Lite mode (v3): For smaller bundle size and faster runtime without conflict resolution, use the /lite import:

import {tv} from "tailwind-variants/lite";

⚠️ Upgrading?

• From v2 to v3: See the v3 migration guide
• From v1 to v2: See the v2 migration guide

2. Usage:

import {tv} from "tailwind-variants";

const button = tv({
  base: "font-medium bg-blue-500 text-white rounded-full active:opacity-80",
  variants: {
    color: {
      primary: "bg-blue-500 text-white",
      secondary: "bg-purple-500 text-white",
    },
    size: {
      sm: "text-sm",
      md: "text-base",
      lg: "px-4 py-3 text-lg",
    },
  },
  compoundVariants: [
    {
      size: ["sm", "md"],
      class: "px-3 py-1",
    },
  ],
  defaultVariants: {
    size: "md",
    color: "primary",
  },
});

return <button className={button({size: "sm", color: "secondary"})}>Click me</button>;

Utility Functions

Tailwind Variants provides several utility functions for combining and merging class names:

cx - Simple Concatenation

Combines class names without merging conflicting classes (similar to clsx):

import {cx} from "tailwind-variants";

cx("text-xl", "font-bold"); // => "text-xl font-bold"
cx("px-2", "px-4"); // => "px-2 px-4" (no merging)

cn - Merge with Default Config

Updated in v3.2.2 - Now returns a string directly (no function call needed)

Combines class names and merges conflicting Tailwind CSS classes using the default tailwind-merge config. Returns a string directly:

import {cn} from "tailwind-variants";

cn("bg-red-500", "bg-blue-500"); // => "bg-blue-500"
cn("px-2", "px-4", "py-2"); // => "px-4 py-2"

cnMerge - Merge with Custom Config

Available from v3.2.2

Combines class names and merges conflicting Tailwind CSS classes with support for custom twMerge configuration via a second function call:

import {cnMerge} from "tailwind-variants";

// Disable merging
cnMerge("px-2", "px-4")({twMerge: false}) // => "px-2 px-4"

// Enable merging explicitly
cnMerge("bg-red-500", "bg-blue-500")({twMerge: true}) // => "bg-blue-500"

// Use custom twMergeConfig
cnMerge("px-2", "px-4")({twMergeConfig: {...}}) // => merged with custom config

When to use which:

• Use cx when you want simple concatenation without any merging
• Use cn for most cases when you want automatic conflict resolution with default settings
• Use cnMerge when you need to customize the merge behavior (disable merging, custom config, etc.)

Acknowledgements

• cva (Joe Bell) This project as started as an extension of Joe's work on cva – a great tool for generating variants for a single element with Tailwind CSS. Big shoutout to Joe Bell and contributors you guys rock! 🤘 - we recommend to use cva if don't need any of the Tailwind Variants features listed here.

• Stitches (Modulz)
  The pioneers of the variants API movement. Inmense thanks to Modulz for their work on Stitches and the community around it. 🙏

Community

We're excited to see the community adopt HeroUI, raise issues, and provide feedback. Whether it's a feature request, bug report, or a project to showcase, please get involved!

• Discord
• Twitter
• GitHub Discussions

Contributing

Contributions are always welcome!

Please follow our contributing guidelines.

Please adhere to this project's CODE_OF_CONDUCT.

Authors

• Junior garcia (@jrgarciadev)
• Tianen Pang (@tianenpang)

License

Licensed under the MIT License.

See LICENSE for more information.