@linaria/core is a zero-runtime CSS-in-JS library that offers a seamless way to style your components using JavaScript. It allows you to write CSS directly in your JavaScript files, eliminating the need for a build step or runtime CSS processing. Linaria provides excellent performance by extracting styles at build time and generating minimal CSS output.
Tailwind CSS is a utility-first CSS framework that provides a set of pre-built classes to style your web projects. It focuses on rapid development and customization by offering a low-level utility approach, allowing you to quickly style your components without writing custom CSS. Tailwind CSS is highly configurable, enabling you to create unique designs while maintaining consistency across your project.
Tailwind CSS is a widely popular utility-first CSS framework that has gained significant popularity in recent years. It has a large and active community, and many developers use it in their projects. On the other hand, @linaria/core is a more specialized package for CSS-in-JS solution, and while it has a dedicated user base, it may not be as popular or widely recognized as Tailwind CSS.
Approach
Tailwind CSS follows a utility-first approach, providing a set of pre-defined utility classes that you can use in your HTML templates to style your components. It allows for rapid development and consistent styling across the project. @linaria/core, on the other hand, is a CSS-in-JS solution that enables you to write CSS styles within your JavaScript or TypeScript files using tagged template literals. It provides more granular control over styling and allows for dynamic and reusable styles.
Configuration
Tailwind CSS requires a build step where you define and configure your utility classes. It provides a highly configurable setup where you can customize your generated CSS by editing a configuration file. @linaria/core, on the other hand, requires minimal configuration. It integrates smoothly with popular bundlers like Webpack and Rollup, and you can start using it with minimal setup.
Developer Experience
Tailwind CSS offers a comprehensive set of utility classes, which makes it easy to quickly style components without writing custom CSS. It has excellent documentation and provides a consistent and intuitive development experience. @linaria/core, as part of the Linaria ecosystem, provides a smooth developer experience for CSS-in-JS. It offers strong type support for TypeScript users, has good documentation, and provides features like hot-reloading for easier development.
Customization
Tailwind CSS offers extensive customization options. You can override default utility classes, add custom utility classes, and configure design tokens to match your project's brand and requirements. @linaria/core allows for more fine-grained customization of styles within your components. You can use dynamic CSS based on props or other runtime data, create reusable styles using composition, and benefit from the modularity and reusability of JavaScript or TypeScript.
Size and Performance
Tailwind CSS, when used in a production build, generates a large CSS file due to the number of utility classes it provides. However, it implements various optimizations to ensure that the final bundle size is minimized in production. @linaria/core generates optimized CSS-in-JS styles at runtime. The final bundle size depends on the number and complexity of styles used in your components. It provides more control over the size of the generated CSS.
