Base UI Component Library for Accessible React UIs

What Is the Base UI?

Base UI is a set of unstyled React components that handle the hard parts (interaction patterns, keyboard support, ARIA) while letting you style everything yourself. It’s built for composability and long-term maintainability when you’re building a real design system.

If you like the idea of “primitives” or “building blocks” instead of pre-themed components, Base UI fits that workflow.

What features does Base UI offer? ✨

It’s designed to be flexible first, not pretty by default. The big wins:

Unstyled by default (no bundled CSS)
Accessible patterns baked in (WAI-ARIA aligned)
Composable APIs (easy to wrap, extend, or swap parts)
Works with your styling choice (Tailwind, CSS Modules, CSS-in-JS, plain CSS)
Docs are LLM-friendly (pages offer “View as Markdown” + an llms.txt entry)

What components are included in Base UI? 📒

You get a broad set of common building blocks, including things like Accordion, Dialog, Menu/Menubar, Navigation Menu, Popover, Select, Tabs, Toast, Tooltip, Slider, Switch, and more.

It also includes helpful utilities (providers and helpers) to support real app setups.

What are the pros and cons of Base UI?

Base UI is great when you want control, but that comes with tradeoffs.

Pros ✅

You control the look 100% (no fighting a theme)
Strong accessibility baseline (less DIY ARIA work)
Easy to compose into your design system
MIT licensed (simple for commercial use)

Cons ⚠️

You must provide styling (it won’t look “done” out of the box)
Design consistency is on you (tokens, theming, UI rules)
Some teams may prefer pre-styled speed for prototypes

How do you integrate Base UI into a React app?

Typical integration is straightforward, especially if you already have a styling approach.

Pick your styling setup (Tailwind, CSS Modules, CSS-in-JS, etc.)
Wrap Base UI primitives into your own branded components (Button, Input, etc.)
Lean on the docs and component “anatomy” to assemble only the parts you need
If you use AI helpers, share the docs “Markdown view” or llms.txt to keep answers accurate
If you’re still on the older @mui/base, plan a move: it’s marked as deprecated and points to Base UI as the replacement

FAQ

Is Base UI tied to any styling library?

No, it’s built to work with basically any CSS approach, because it ships unstyled.

Is it okay for production apps?

Yes, the project is positioned as a long-term foundation, and the site lists real teams using it.

Does it help with accessibility work?

That’s a core focus: components follow WAI-ARIA patterns and are designed around accessible behavior

Can I use it commercially?

Yes, it’s MIT licensed, which is generally commercial-friendly

Base UI