# MUI (Material UI)

8 Hacker News commenters recommended MUI (Material UI) and 7 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 7 of 13 months.

**Verdict:** Developers recommend MUI as a cohesive, complete React component library with a free data grid. Critics call it bloated and say its modal dialogs hurt accessibility.

## Why people recommend it

- Cohesive, complete component library (2 comments): "They provide coherence and many styles to choose from" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48508075)) "far more broad, complete and cohesive as a whole" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46207115))
- Good overall React experience (3 comments): "more than happy with React, Redux and MUI for a long while at this point." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46245719)) "I've yet to see a better overall experience than React+MUI myself." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46207203)) "now I think it's at good level and usable" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47573253))

## What people warn about

- Heavy, sluggish, slows first paint (3 comments): "bloated do-everything libraries. Ant, MUI, Mantine, or whatever else is aimed to be a superset of all possible website needs" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48274903)) "creates real friction for SSR, streaming, and time-to-first-paint" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46572662)) "that general lethargic feel to the UI was noticeable" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48945861))
- Accessibility failures with modal dialogs (2 comments): "mainstream React frameworks still aren't using the element and without that you will fail WCAG" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47852664)) "you can't really pass accessibility reviews if you use the modal dialogs that come with MUI" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47089218))
- Seen as dreadful, lazy choice (2 comments): "MUI is one of the most dreadful UI libraries I have ever had to use." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48796421)) "It's mind-bogglingly lazy to choose something like MUI (Material UI)" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49156792))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [shadcn/ui](https://hackerapproved.com/p/shadcn-ui.md): 82 recommend
- [Jelly UI](https://hackerapproved.com/p/jelly-ui.md): 41 recommend
- [Tailwind UI](https://hackerapproved.com/p/tailwind-ui.md): 38 recommend
- [Performative-UI](https://hackerapproved.com/p/performative-ui.md): 38 recommend
- [Radix UI](https://hackerapproved.com/p/radix.md): 20 recommend

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "MUI (Material UI)", https://hackerapproved.com/p/mui/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).