Liquid tab bar

When to use #

Use it for

A mobile app with three to five top-level destinations.
You want a bit of character in navigation.

Skip it when

There are more than five destinations.
The product is dense and utilitarian.

Installation #

terminal

pnpm dlx shadcn@latest add @caliper/liquid-tab-bar

Adds its 2 files to components/ui/, each with its own stylesheet, and installs their packages. Pro installs with your access token, set up once per project. See Pro access. The first part also adds Caliper UI’s tokens; import them once as in Installation.

Usage #

Import it from your copy of the source. The example behind the preview comes with the source.

example.tsx

import { LiquidTabBar } from "@/components/ui/liquid-tab-bar"

The worked example comes with Pro

The 18-line example behind the preview opens here with a Pro or Team licence.

Checking your licence…

API reference #

LiquidTabBar

component

PropTypeDefaultDescription

label *string—

items *readonly BarItem[]—

value *string—

onValueChange *(id: string) => void—

variant"liquid" | "glass""liquid""liquid" is a solid bar with a stretching blob; "glass" is a floating frosted pill that opens the chosen label.

classNamestring—

It exposes tablist and tab semantics, with aria-selected, aria-label and aria-hidden kept in step with state.

KeyBehaviour

→Moves to the next item or value.

←Moves to the previous item or value.

HomeJumps to the first item or the minimum.

EndJumps to the last item or the maximum.

Motion #

Transitions use the shared duration and easing tokens. Under prefers-reduced-motion those tokens collapse to instant and travel distances go to zero, so state changes still happen without movement.