14 VueJS UI Component Libraries and Frameworks for Speedy Development

Vue.js has grown to become one of the most popular JavaScript frameworks for building user interfaces and single-page applications. With over 1800+ stars on GitHub and a strong community backing, Vue offers a lightweight and versatile way to develop complex frontends.

One of the main advantages of Vue is its component-based architecture. The Vue framework makes it easy to build reusable UI components that can be composed together to build complex interfaces. Vue’s single-file components contain the component logic, styles, and templates in one .vue file. These components can then be shared across different parts of your application.

While it‘s possible to build UIs from scratch using Vue, UI component libraries and frameworks speed up development significantly. These libraries provide pre-built Vue components implementing common UI elements like buttons, tables, modals, etc. Developers can use these readymade components instead of coding everything from scratch.

In this comprehensive guide, we will look at the top 14 VueJS UI libraries and frameworks that can accelerate your frontend development workflow.

Benefits of using Vue UI libraries

Here are some of the main reasons for using UI component libraries in your Vue projects:

Faster development: UI libraries provide ready-to-use components for common UI tasks like forms, navigation, modals, etc. This saves precious dev time.
Consistent UI: Using standardized components ensures a consistent look and feel across your app.
Best practices: The components follow Vue best practices and conventions. This results in cleaner code.
Documentation: Components come fully documented so developers don‘t have to reinvent the wheel.
Customizable: Components can be themed/customized as per your branding needs.
Active maintenance: Libraries are actively maintained by the open-source community. Bugs are fixed, and new features added regularly.
Responsive support: Components responsively adapt across device sizes and screen widths.
Accessibility: Components follow accessibility standards like ARIA roles, keyboard support, etc.
Cross-browser support: Components render consistently across modern browsers.

Let‘s now look at some of the most popular Vue UI libraries used by developers worldwide.

1. Vuetify

Vuetify is one of the most mature and widely used component libraries for Vue. It offers a collection of over 80 high-quality components like buttons, cards, dialogs, etc.

The components strictly follow Material Design specifications. The material styling gives a modern and consistent look across components.

Some key features of Vuetify:

Provides ready-to-use Material Design components out of the box
Components can be easily customized via props, classes, and CSS
Offers responsive grid system for building layouts
Ships with pre-defined themes and colour palettes
Has excellent documentation with live examples
Integrates well with Vue router and Vuex

For quickly building material styled apps, Vuetify is a great choice. The library keeps growing with new components and features added through frequent releases.

2. BootstrapVue

BootstrapVue integrates Bootstrap styling and components into Vue apps. With over 80 components and 1,200+ icons, it provides everything required to build rich user interfaces.

BootstrapVue components are built on top of the popular Bootstrap CSS framework. So it naturally inherits features like responsiveness, theming, etc. from Bootstrap itself.

Here are some salient features provided by BootstrapVue:

Large collection of components like buttons, cards, forms, tables, etc.
Integrates seamlessly with both Bootstrap CSS and JS
Ships with utility classes for layout, spacing, flexbox, etc.
Easy to theme using SCSS variables
Lightweight at only ~19kb when minified and gzipped
Detailed documentation with live examples for all components

For apps that require Bootstrap styling, BootstrapVue components are the best match. The library perfectly complements the CSS framework while adding rich interactivity using Vue.

3. Quasar

Quasar is a Vue component library as well as a full framework for building SPA, SSR, PWA, Mobile (Cordova, Capacitor), and Desktop (Electron) apps using the same codebase.

It offers a suite of over 40 Vue components following Material Design principles. The components are developer-friendly with advanced customization options.

Key features of Quasar:

Supports building for Web, Mobile, and Desktop using same code
Provides utility-first CSS framework like flexbox, spacing, color, etc.
Offers dark, light, and iOS themes out of the box
Components provide rich customization options
Has in-depth documentation with examples
Integrates well with Vue CLI projects

For developers looking to target multiple platforms (web/mobile/electron), Quasar is an excellent option. The library takes care of optimizing components for each platform allowing you to focus on business logic.

4. Vuesax

Vuesax provides a collection of over 70 customizable Vue components with a fresh and beautiful design.

Unlike other libraries, Vuesax does not follow any specific design system. This gives it a distinct look and feel compared to traditional material styling.

Some useful features of Vuesax:

Clean and unique UI with custom SVG icons
Detailed documentation with live playground
Customize colors, sizes, radii, padding, etc. via props
Ships with Sketch and Figma files for mockups
Follows Atomic Design Methodology
Integrates well with UI frameworks like Bootstrap

For customizable components with clean and modern aesthetics, Vuesax is a great pick. The library is actively maintained making it future-proof choice.

5. Ant Design Vue

Ant Design Vue is the Vue implementation of the highly popular Ant Design system. It provides a suite of UI components modeled on Ant Design React components.

The key features offered by Ant Design Vue are:

Large collection of customizable Ant Design components
Detailed docs with live demos for each component
Supports server-side rendering for improved performance
Ships with multiple premade templates and themes
Components can be imported individually on demand
Follows Ant Design specs and design values

For developers already using Ant Design in React apps, this Vue library allows reusing existing design resources. The components retain the minimal style and visual consistency expected from Ant Design.

6. Element UI

Element is an elegant Vue 2 component library for developers, designers and product managers. It contains a suite of over 60 customizable UI components.

Some key traits of Element UI:

Provides components for layout, navigation, buttons, data entry and more
Ships with multiple premade themes
Supports custom theme creation using SCSS variables
Detailed docs with live examples for components
Components have well-designed animations and transitions
Follows Web Accessibility standards
Lightweight at only ~31kb gzipped

Element follows common design language making it easy even for non-devs to understand. For creating MVPs or prototyping, Element is a great choice.

7. Buefy

Buefy is a lightweight Vue UI library based on Bulma CSS framework and design. It recreates Bulma components as Vue components.

Here are some useful features provided by Buefy:

Very lightweight with Bulma as the only dependency
Offers components like buttons, modals, dropdowns, pagination etc.
Low-level components to build custom UIs
Customizable styling using props
Detailed documentation for components
Follows accessibility standards

The minimal footprint and Bulma styling of Buefy make it ideal for Bulma-based apps needing Vue interactivity.

8. Chakra UI

Chakra UI is a simple modular and accessible component library for your Vue applications. It provides over 120 UI components like forms, tabs, cards, buttons etc.

Some notable features:

Components are built with customization and extensibility in mind
Follows WAI-ARIA standards for accessibility
Comes with light and dark mode out of the box
Smaller bundle size compared to alternatives
Detailed documentation with examples
Offers both CSS-in-JS and Stylesheet options

For building complex UIs while keeping bundle sizes in check, Chakra UI is a great option. The modular nature and customizability accelerate development.

9. PrimeVue

PrimeVue is a flexible yet feature-packed Vue UI component library. It contains over 60 customizable components for applications across domains.

Some useful highlights of PrimeVue:

Components for data display, input selection, buttons and more
Ships with multiple premade themes
Also offers theme customization via Theme Designer
Lightweight and modular structure
Detailed documentation with live demos
Components follow Vue best practices

For enterprise applications with complex UIs, PrimeVue is a great choice. The theming flexibility allows matching your corp design scheme.

10. Semantic UI Vue

Semantic UI Vue integrates the Semantic UI CSS framework into Vue apps. It provides Semantic UI themes and components as Vue components.

Key features:

Includes Semantic UI components like buttons, cards, accodions etc.
Makes it easy to theme apps with Semantic UI
Detailed documentation with live code examples
Optimized components with small footprint
Active maintenance and updates by community
Integrates seamlessly with existing Semantic UI themes

For developers already using Semantic UI, this library is a perfect fit. It brings the styling and interactivity of Semantic UI into Vue projects.

11. Keen UI

Keen UI is a lightweight collection of essential UI components inspired by Material Design. It provides Vue.js components needed to build complete user interfaces.

Some salient features:

Includes 30+ components covering common UI needs
Supports light and dark modes
Components feature clean animations
Customizable styling via props
Detailed docs with examples for each component
Lightweight at ~17kb min+gzip
Open source and available on GitHub

For adding material styled components without a bulky footprint, Keen UI is a solid option. The clean codebase makes it easy to grok and customize.

12. Core UI

CoreUI provides over 200 customizable components and 40+ Vue admin templates for building responsive web apps.

Some useful characteristics:

Huge collection of UI components for all use cases
Templates for admin panels, e-commerce, SAAS etc.
Detailed documentation with live demos
Built for web but can be ported to mobile
Handles client-side rendering and theming
Components accept HTML markup for icons
Smaller bundle size compared to other libraries

For admin dashboards and data-driven apps, CoreUI provides all the UI building blocks. The inclusion of premade templates accelerates development.

13. Vue Material

Vue Material offers a suite of over 70 flexible components following Google‘s Material Design System. This makes building responsive and mobile-first UIs easier.

Notable aspects:

Provides components like buttons, cards, menus, chips etc.
Ships with multiple premade themes
Offers SASS/SCSS based theming
Components have styled animations
Follows Material Design principles
Detailed docs with playground
Integrates well with Vue Router and Vuex

For Material designed apps, Vue Material provides off-the-shelf components saving tons of time. Building custom UIs by combining components is seamless.

14. VueTailwind

VueTailwind provides customizable Tailwind CSS components for Vue. It has over 100 components covering various use cases like navigation, forms, modals, etc.

Salient features:

All components designed for Tailwind CSS
Modular import structure
Customization via component props
Variety of components for diverse needs
Detailed docs with examples
Ships with full theme customization
Available on GitHub

For Tailwind CSS users, VueTailwind integrates perfectly. Building UIs using existing Tailwind classes results in clean code.

Conclusion

Vue UI component libraries and frameworks accelerate frontend development by providing ready-to-use components. They save precious dev time and ensure consistency in styling.

Each library discussed here has its own benefits and use cases. Vuetify and Element UI are great for generic web apps. Quasar allows targeting multiple platforms from the same codebase. UI libraries like BootstrapVue and Buefy integrate perfectly with CSS frameworks. PrimeVue and CoreUI excel for complex enterprise UIs. And options like Vuesax and Chakra UI provide extensive customization ability.

I hope this guide gives you a comprehensive overview of the most popular Vue UI libraries for quickly building feature-rich user interfaces. Let me know which one seems most relevant to your next Vue project!