MUI (Material UI)
Shares rank 9 of 14 UI component libraries by recommenders
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.
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.
15 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 8
- criticize it
- 7
- approval share
- 53%
Recommended in 7 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: 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
- 8 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- 1.1 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 7 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, 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
Cohesive, complete component library
“They provide coherence and many styles to choose from”
Comment from 12 Jun 2026 in “Slightly reducing the sloppiness of AI generated front end” “far more broad, complete and cohesive as a whole”
Comment from 9 Dec 2025 in “No ARIA is better than bad ARIA” Good overall React experience
“more than happy with React, Redux and MUI for a long while at this point.”
Comment from 12 Dec 2025 in “Denial of service and source code exposure in React Server Components” “I've yet to see a better overall experience than React+MUI myself.”
Comment from 9 Dec 2025 in “No ARIA is better than bad ARIA” “now I think it's at good level and usable”
Comment from 30 Mar 2026 in “Just released 3 examples for my native HTML/CSS UI for windows, feedback welcome”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Heavy, sluggish, slows first paint
“bloated do-everything libraries. Ant, MUI, Mantine, or whatever else is aimed to be a superset of all possible website needs”
Comment from 26 May 2026 in “Does Anybody Actually Like React?” “creates real friction for SSR, streaming, and time-to-first-paint”
Comment from 11 Jan 2026 in “AI is a business model stress test” “that general lethargic feel to the UI was noticeable”
Comment from 17 Jul 2026 in “Old Icons” Accessibility failures with modal dialogs
“mainstream React frameworks still aren't using the element and without that you will fail WCAG”
Comment from 21 Apr 2026 in “Modern Front end Complexity: essential or accidental?” “you can't really pass accessibility reviews if you use the modal dialogs that come with MUI”
Comment from 20 Feb 2026 in “Web Components: The Framework-Free Renaissance” Seen as dreadful, lazy choice
“MUI is one of the most dreadful UI libraries I have ever had to use.”
Comment from 5 Jul 2026 in “Shadcn/UI now defaults to Base UI instead of Radix” “It's mind-bogglingly lazy to choose something like MUI (Material UI)”
Comment from 3 Aug 2026 in “Bonsai: Janestreet's UI Library”
Other UI component libraries people recommend
The four most recommended other UI component libraries, 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| shadcn/ui | 82 | 54 | 60% | 12 | 1 yr3 owners | — |
| Jelly UI | 41 | 38 | 52% | 1 | — | — |
| Tailwind UI | 38 | 28 | 58% | 3 | — | — |
| Performative-UI | 38 | 8 | 83% | 2 | — | — |
| MUI (Material UI)This page | 8 | 7 | 53% | 7 | — | — |
What people said
20 of the 21 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“It's mind-bogglingly lazy to choose something like MUI (Material UI)”
“that general lethargic feel to the UI was noticeable”
“it was a fantastic system for programming user interfaces and for displaying user interfaces”
“we don’t have to make too many architecture decisions – we just do whatever MUI does”
“MUI is one of the most dreadful UI libraries I have ever had to use.”
“you’d find react 17 wasn’t supported”
“They provide coherence and many styles to choose from”
“bloated do-everything libraries. Ant, MUI, Mantine, or whatever else is aimed to be a superset of all possible website needs”
“mainstream React frameworks still aren't using the element and without that you will fail WCAG”
“When MUI computes the coordinates wrong and something draws 20px right of where it should be... I fix it.”
“now I think it's at good level and usable”
“you can't really pass accessibility reviews if you use the modal dialogs that come with MUI”
“MUI or Mantine for the components”
“MUI provides a styled() function and a component, either one of which could have been used”
“creates real friction for SSR, streaming, and time-to-first-paint”
“it doesn't even offer anything like DataGrid (free with mui)”
“more than happy with React, Redux and MUI for a long while at this point.”
“I've yet to see a better overall experience than React+MUI myself.”
“far more broad, complete and cohesive as a whole”
“I'm not familiar with any open-source alternatives that come close”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.