@vanilla-extract/vite-plugin

What is @vanilla-extract/vite-plugin?

@vanilla-extract/vite-plugin is a Vite plugin that integrates with the vanilla-extract CSS-in-JS library. It allows developers to use vanilla-extract's zero-runtime CSS framework within Vite projects, enabling the creation of type-safe, themeable, and performant styles.

What are @vanilla-extract/vite-plugin's main functionalities?

Integration with Vite

This feature allows you to integrate vanilla-extract with a Vite project. By adding the plugin to the Vite configuration, you can use vanilla-extract's CSS-in-JS capabilities seamlessly within your Vite application.

import { defineConfig } from 'vite';
import vanillaExtractPlugin from '@vanilla-extract/vite-plugin';

export default defineConfig({
  plugins: [vanillaExtractPlugin()]
});

Type-safe CSS

This feature allows you to define styles using TypeScript, ensuring type safety and autocompletion. The styles are compiled to static CSS at build time, providing a zero-runtime solution.

import { style } from '@vanilla-extract/css';

export const button = style({
  backgroundColor: 'blue',
  color: 'white',
  padding: '10px 20px',
  borderRadius: '5px'
});

Theming support

This feature allows you to create themes and use them in your styles. The createTheme function generates CSS variables that can be used throughout your styles, making it easy to switch themes dynamically.

import { createTheme, style } from '@vanilla-extract/css';

export const [themeClass, vars] = createTheme({
  color: {
    primary: 'blue',
    secondary: 'green'
  }
});

export const button = style({
  backgroundColor: vars.color.primary,
  color: 'white'
});

Other packages similar to @vanilla-extract/vite-plugin

styled-components

styled-components is a popular CSS-in-JS library that allows you to write CSS within your JavaScript files. It provides a different approach compared to vanilla-extract by using tagged template literals and has a runtime component, whereas vanilla-extract focuses on zero-runtime and static extraction of styles.

emotion

Emotion is another CSS-in-JS library that offers both runtime and zero-runtime (via the 'css' prop) styling solutions. It provides a more flexible API compared to vanilla-extract, which is more focused on static extraction and type safety.

linaria

Linaria is a zero-runtime CSS-in-JS library similar to vanilla-extract. It allows you to write styles in JavaScript and extracts them to CSS files at build time. Linaria focuses on performance and developer experience, similar to vanilla-extract, but with a different API and approach.

README

🧁 vanilla-extract

Zero-runtime Stylesheets-in-TypeScript.

Write your styles in TypeScript (or JavaScript) with locally scoped class names and CSS Variables, then generate static CSS files at build time.

Basically, it’s “CSS Modules-in-TypeScript” but with scoped CSS Variables + heaps more.

🔥   All styles generated at build time — just like Sass, Less, etc.

✨   Minimal abstraction over standard CSS.

🦄   Works with any front-end framework — or even without one.

🌳   Locally scoped class names — just like CSS Modules.

🚀   Locally scoped CSS Variables, @keyframes and @font-face rules.

🎨   High-level theme system with support for simultaneous themes. No globals!

🛠   Utils for generating variable-based calc expressions.

💪   Type-safe styles via CSSType.

🏃‍♂️   Optional runtime version for development and testing.

🙈   Optional API for dynamic runtime theming.

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🌐 Check out the documentation site for setup guides, examples and API docs.

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🖥   Try it out for yourself in CodeSandbox.

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Write your styles in .css.ts files.

// styles.css.ts

import { createTheme, style } from '@vanilla-extract/css';

export const [themeClass, vars] = createTheme({
  color: {
    brand: 'blue'
  },
  font: {
    body: 'arial'
  }
});

export const exampleStyle = style({
  backgroundColor: vars.color.brand,
  fontFamily: vars.font.body,
  color: 'white',
  padding: 10
});

💡 Once you've configured your build tooling, these .css.ts files will be evaluated at build time. None of the code in these files will be included in your final bundle. Think of it as using TypeScript as your preprocessor instead of Sass, Less, etc.

Then consume them in your markup.

// app.ts

import { themeClass, exampleStyle } from './styles.css.ts';

document.write(`
  <section class="${themeClass}">
    <h1 class="${exampleStyle}">Hello world!</h1>
  </section>
`);

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Want to work at a higher level while maximising style re-use? Check out 🍨 Sprinkles, our official zero-runtime atomic CSS framework, built on top of vanilla-extract.

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Thanks

• Nathan Nam Tran for creating css-in-js-loader, which served as the initial starting point for treat, the precursor to this library.
• Stitches for getting us excited about CSS-Variables-in-JS.
• SEEK for giving us the space to do interesting work.

License

MIT.