LiftKit
Shares rank 21 of 45 GUI frameworks by recommenders
Free open-source UI framework whose components and website look polished and satisfying. Critics reject its golden-ratio basis and say its examples are biased and its components are shown as images.
Free open-source UI framework whose components and website look polished and satisfying. Critics reject its golden-ratio basis and say its examples are biased and its components are shown as images.
45 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 18
- criticize it
- 27
- approval share
- 40%
Recommended in 1 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 18 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 0.6 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 1 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, not met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Polished, satisfying visual design
“the moment I opened the page there was something unusually satisfying about the buttons”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” “This is a great idea and satisfying is the correct word to describe the homepage.”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” “That small change makes the layout feel so intentional, polished, and complete”
Comment from 11 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” - Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"”
- Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"”
Admired idea and project
“I love the project -- even if I agree with a lot of the critique in this thread.”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” “This design system really deserves its own site.”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” “I always wanted something like this, too.”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” - Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Golden-ratio basis called pseudoscience
“which looks well made and useful, is being completely undermined with this nonsensical pseudoscience”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” “I haven't found a compelling reason that phi is inherently superior, aesthetically speaking.”
Comment from 9 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” “It's kind of a good example why designers don't purely rely on mathematically consistent designs.”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” Comparison examples look biased or worse
“changing the background color in the before/after feels like you're purposefully trying to make the before one look worse”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” “making the shadcn/materialui elements darker/low contrast is highly dishonest”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” “many of the website’s examples look worse than what they compare against”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” Components shown as images, not live
“I clicked on Dropdown, thinking it's one of the more complex things to implement. It doesn't even have a picture.”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” “It's a pretty big red flag for ui frameworks not to be able to render their ui components in their own docs.”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” “all of the components are shown as images instead of instances of the actual UI framework”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” Spacing and alignment look off
“I don't think their homepage looks good, and for so much attention to detail the padding around text titles and other spacing, specially on mobile, doesn't look good.”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"” “things look off center and the overall "weight" of components feels off”
Comment from 10 Feb 2026 in “LiftKit – UI where "everything derives from the golden ratio"”
Other GUI frameworks people recommend
The four most recommended other GUI frameworks, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Qt | 191 | 133 | 59% | 12 | 15 yrs7 owners | — |
| GTK | 85 | 118 | 42% | 12 | — | — |
| Windows Forms | 76 | 33 | 70% | 12 | 15 yrs3 owners | Approved |
| SwiftUI | 75 | 121 | 38% | 11 | 4 yrs8 owners | — |
| LiftKitThis page | 18 | 27 | 40% | 1 | — | — |
What people said
40 of the 52 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“That's just something that would dissuade me from choosing it!”
“That small change makes the layout feel so intentional, polished, and complete”
“many of the website’s examples look worse than what they compare against”
“the website is VERY good looking imo”
“what you've built is pretty cool”
“changing the background color in the before/after feels like you're purposefully trying to make the before one look worse”
“It appears to be present on the snackbar component for example.”
“the moment I opened the page there was something unusually satisfying about the buttons”
“This is a great idea and satisfying is the correct word to describe the homepage.”
“it's not semantic and using utility classes like tailwind”
“It's a pretty big red flag for ui frameworks not to be able to render their ui components in their own docs.”
“making the shadcn/materialui elements darker/low contrast is highly dishonest”
“the design is not intuitive enough for me to know which is the LiftKit”
“I don't think their homepage looks good, and for so much attention to detail the padding around text titles and other spacing, specially on mobile, doesn't look good.”
“lags horribly when scrolling on Firefox”
“I always wanted something like this, too.”
“Cool stuff, I think I'll never be able to unsee the extra top padding all over the web now haha”
“I love the project -- even if I agree with a lot of the critique in this thread.”
“the dumpster fire and deprecation warnings in the docs make me want to try this”
“The CSS is vanilla at least.”
“I also had a lot of trouble figuring out which side was supposed to be which.”
“which looks well made and useful, is being completely undermined with this nonsensical pseudoscience”
“If you got rid of the slider entirely and just had it flick between the two images instantly”
“it's hella pushy about that isn't it? really need to tone it down”
“realised I was saying it for the before in every example”
“LIFTKIT IS FREE AND OPEN SOURCE. The website's just out of date.”
“the image on the right looks much better than the one on the left”
“why not just make it a fuckin tailwind plugin lol”
“how could they charge for the secret golden ratio code lol”
“I really wish they would start with "this is for next.js/react".”
“It's kind of a good example why designers don't purely rely on mathematically consistent designs.”
“this thing bills itself as the The UI Framework for Perfectionists”
“I wouldn’t trust a framework that requires me to involve myself with JavaScript, nextJS, and React”
“This design system really deserves its own site.”
“I clicked on Dropdown, thinking it's one of the more complex things to implement. It doesn't even have a picture.”
“all of the components are shown as images instead of instances of the actual UI framework”
“things look off center and the overall "weight" of components feels off”
“the components look gorgeous and really well laid out”
“came out to a whopping $16,500 (you're reading that right... SIXTEEN THOUSAND). No thanks.”
“I haven't found a compelling reason that phi is inherently superior, aesthetically speaking.”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.