What is react-router?
The react-router npm package is a declarative routing library for React, allowing you to add navigation functionality to your React applications. It enables you to handle URL routing, match routes to your React components, and manage navigation state in a single-page application (SPA) environment.
What are react-router's main functionalities?
Basic Routing
This code demonstrates how to set up basic routing in a React application using react-router. It includes navigation links and route components that render different components based on the URL path.
import { BrowserRouter as Router, Route, Link } from 'react-router-dom';
function App() {
return (
<Router>
<div>
<nav>
<ul>
<li>
<Link to='/'>Home</Link>
</li>
<li>
<Link to='/about'>About</Link>
</li>
</ul>
</nav>
<Route exact path='/' component={Home} />
<Route path='/about' component={About} />
</div>
</Router>
);
}
function Home() {
return <h2>Home</h2>;
}
function About() {
return <h2>About</h2>;
}
Dynamic Routing
This code snippet shows how to implement dynamic routing with path parameters. The User component will render with the appropriate user ID based on the URL.
import { BrowserRouter as Router, Route, Link } from 'react-router-dom';
function App() {
return (
<Router>
<div>
<ul>
<li>
<Link to='/users/1'>User 1</Link>
</li>
<li>
<Link to='/users/2'>User 2</Link>
</li>
</ul>
<Route path='/users/:id' component={User} />
</div>
</Router>
);
}
function User({ match }) {
return <h2>User ID: {match.params.id}</h2>;
}
Nested Routing
Nested routing allows you to create routes within routes. This example shows a Layout component with a nested Dashboard route.
import { BrowserRouter as Router, Route, Link, Switch } from 'react-router-dom';
function App() {
return (
<Router>
<Route path='/' component={Layout} />
</Router>
);
}
function Layout({ match }) {
return (
<div>
<nav>
<Link to={`${match.url}dashboard`}>Dashboard</Link>
</nav>
<Switch>
<Route path={`${match.path}dashboard`} component={Dashboard} />
</Switch>
</div>
);
}
function Dashboard() {
return <h2>Dashboard</h2>;
}
Protected Routes
Protected routes are used to restrict access to certain parts of your application. This example shows a route that renders a component only if the user is authenticated, otherwise it redirects to a login page.
import { BrowserRouter as Router, Route, Redirect } from 'react-router-dom';
function App() {
return (
<Router>
<Route path='/protected' render={() => (
isAuthenticated() ? (
<ProtectedComponent />
) : (
<Redirect to='/login' />
)
)} />
</Router>
);
}
function isAuthenticated() {
// Authentication logic here
return true;
}
function ProtectedComponent() {
return <h2>Protected</h2>;
}
Other packages similar to react-router
vue-router
Vue-router is the official router for Vue.js. It provides similar functionalities for Vue applications as react-router does for React applications, including nested routes, dynamic segments, and navigation guards. However, it is designed to work seamlessly with Vue's reactivity system.
reach-router
Reach Router is another routing library for React, which aims to be more accessible and simpler to use than react-router. It has a smaller API surface area and focuses on accessibility by managing focus after route transitions. However, as of my knowledge cutoff in 2023, Reach Router has been officially merged with React Router, and its features have been integrated into React Router v6.
A complete routing library for React
React Router keeps your UI in sync with the URL. It has a simple API
with powerful features like lazy code loading, dynamic route matching,
and location transition handling built right in. Make the URL your first
thought, not an after-thought.
Important: This is the master
branch of React Router and may contain changes that are not yet released. To see the code for the most recently published release, browse the latest
tag.
Docs & Help
Note: If you are still using React Router 0.13.x the docs can be found on the 0.13.x branch. Upgrade information is available on the change log.
For questions and support, please visit our channel on Reactiflux or Stack Overflow. The issue tracker is exclusively for bug reports and feature requests.
Browser Support
We support all browsers and environments where React runs.
Installation
Using npm:
$ npm install react-router
Then with a module bundler like webpack that supports either CommonJS or ES2015 modules, use as you would anything else:
import { Router, Route, Link } from 'react-router'
var Router = require('react-router').Router
var Route = require('react-router').Route
var Link = require('react-router').Link
The UMD build is also available on npmcdn:
<script src="https://npmcdn.com/react-router/umd/ReactRouter.min.js"></script>
You can find the library on window.ReactRouter
.
What's it look like?
import React from 'react'
import { render } from 'react-dom'
import { Router, Route, Link, browserHistory } from 'react-router'
const App = React.createClass({})
const About = React.createClass({})
const Users = React.createClass({
render() {
return (
<div>
<h1>Users</h1>
<div className="master">
<ul>
{/* use Link to route around the app */}
{this.state.users.map(user => (
<li key={user.id}><Link to={`/user/${user.id}`}>{user.name}</Link></li>
))}
</ul>
</div>
<div className="detail">
{this.props.children}
</div>
</div>
)
}
})
const User = React.createClass({
componentDidMount() {
this.setState({
user: findUserById(this.props.params.userId)
})
},
render() {
return (
<div>
<h2>{this.state.user.name}</h2>
{/* etc. */}
</div>
)
}
})
render((
<Router history={browserHistory}>
<Route path="/" component={App}>
<Route path="about" component={About}/>
<Route path="users" component={Users}>
<Route path="/user/:userId" component={User}/>
</Route>
<Route path="*" component={NoMatch}/>
</Route>
</Router>
), document.body)
See more in the Introduction, Advanced Usage, and Examples.
Thanks
Thanks to our sponsors for supporting the development of
React Router.
React Router was initially inspired by Ember's fantastic router. Many thanks to the Ember team.
Also, thanks to BrowserStack for providing the infrastructure that allows us to run our build in real browsers.