Simple Liquid Glass

A tiny, zero-dependency React component that renders a beautiful “liquid” glassmorphism panel using an SVG displacement map. It supports chromatic aberration, adjustable saturation, gradient borders, a configurable semi‑transparent glass color, and automatic text color based on the surrounding background.

Features

• Liquid glassmorphism with SVG displacement
• Auto text color: detects dark/light backgrounds to keep text legible
• Custom glass color: accepts only semi‑transparent colors (rgba, hsla, hex with alpha)
• Background support: solid colors and gradients with automatic transparency conversion
• Chromatic dispersion and blur with fine‑grained controls
• Adjustable saturation to boost or tame color vibrancy
• Chromatic aberration intensity control to tune the vividness of the edge colors
• Gradient border with masking
• Responsive and content‑agnostic
• TypeScript and tree‑shakable builds (ESM and CJS)

Installation

npm install simple-liquid-glass

or with yarn:

yarn add simple-liquid-glass

Usage

Basic Usage

import React from 'react';
import { LiquidGlass } from 'simple-liquid-glass';

function App() {
  return (
    <div style={{ width: '300px', height: '200px' }}>
      <LiquidGlass autoTextColor background="rgba(255,255,255,0.4)">
        <div style={{ padding: '20px' }}>
          <h2>Your Content Here</h2>
          <p>This content has a liquid glass effect!</p>
        </div>
      </LiquidGlass>
    </div>
  );
}

Advanced Usage with Custom Settings

import React from 'react';
import { LiquidGlass } from 'simple-liquid-glass';

function App() {
  return (
    <div style={{ width: '400px', height: '300px' }}>
      <LiquidGlass
        mode="custom"
        scale={200}
        radius={20}
        border={0.1}
        lightness={60}
        displace={0.5}
        alpha={0.8}
        blur={10}
        dispersion={30}
        frost={0.2}
        background="linear-gradient(45deg, #ff6b6b, #4ecdc4)"
        autoTextColor
        textOnDark="#ffffff"
        textOnLight="#111111"
        forceTextColor
        borderColor="rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.5)"
        className="my-glass-container"
        style={{ boxShadow: '0 8px 32px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.1)' }}
      >
        <div style={{ padding: '30px' }}>
          <h1>Custom Glass Effect</h1>
          <p>Fully customized liquid glass morphism with gradient background</p>
        </div>
      </LiquidGlass>
    </div>
  );
}

Preset Mode

The component comes with a beautiful preset that works out of the box:

<LiquidGlass mode="preset">
  <YourContent />
</LiquidGlass>

Note: In preset mode, incoming props still override the preset defaults (e.g., scale, radius, blur, etc.). On iOS, when iosBlurMode is 'auto', a minimal blur (iosMinBlur, default 7px) is applied even if blur is 0 to ensure a visible fallback effect.

The background prop automatically converts solid colors and gradients to semi-transparent (30% opacity) for better glass effects. Images (URLs) are left unchanged.

Props

| Prop | Type | Default | Description | |------|------|---------|-------------| | children | ReactNode | - | Content to display inside the glass effect | | mode | 'preset' \| 'custom' | 'preset' | Use preset values or custom configuration | | scale | number | 160 | Scale of the displacement effect (-360 to 360) | | radius | number | 50 | Border radius of the glass effect | | border | number | 0.05 | Border thickness (0 to 0.5) | | lightness | number | 53 | Lightness of the glass (0 to 100) | | displace | number | 5 | Displacement blur amount (0 to 10) | | alpha | number | 0.9 | Alpha transparency (0 to 1) | | blur | number | 0 | Blur amount for the glass effect | | dispersion | number | 50 | Chromatic dispersion amount | | saturation | number | 140 | Color saturation multiplier (%) applied via CSS saturate() | | aberrationIntensity | number | 0 | Multiplier for chromatic aberration (red/blue separation) | | frost | number | 0.1 | Frost effect intensity (0 to 1) | | borderColor | string | 'rgba(120, 120, 120, 0.7)' | Border color in CSS format | | glassColor | string | 'rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.4)' | Semi‑transparent glass color (rgba, hsla, hsl(.../a), #RGBA, #RRGGBBAA). Invalid/opaque values fall back to frost‑based default | | background | string | - | Background color or gradient (automatically made semi-transparent) | | autoTextColor | boolean | false | Automatically detect background luminance and set text color | | textOnDark | string | '#ffffff' | Text color used when background is detected as dark | | textOnLight | string | '#111111' | Text color used when background is detected as light | | forceTextColor | boolean | false | Force the computed text color on all descendants (!important) to override nested styles | | className | string | - | Additional CSS class names | | style | CSSProperties | - | Additional inline styles | | quality | 'low' \| 'standard' \| 'high' \| 'extreme' | 'low' | Rendering quality preset. 'extreme' matches previous versions' visuals | | autodetectquality | boolean | false | Auto-detect device performance and pick a quality preset | | mobileFallback | 'css-only' \| 'svg' | CSS-only on mobile | Control mobile rendering strategy | | effectMode | 'auto' \| 'svg' \| 'blur' \| 'off' | 'auto' | Control effect: auto, force SVG, force CSS blur, or disable |

Examples

Background with Gradient

<LiquidGlass 
  background="linear-gradient(45deg, #ff6b6b, #4ecdc4)"
  autoTextColor
>
  <div style={{ padding: '20px' }}>
    <h2>Gradient Background</h2>
    <p>This uses a gradient background that's automatically made semi-transparent!</p>
  </div>
</LiquidGlass>

Quality Presets and Autodetection

// Manual quality
<LiquidGlass quality="high" background="rgba(255,255,255,0.35)">
  <Content />
</LiquidGlass>

// Autodetect device performance and choose quality automatically
<LiquidGlass autodetectquality background="rgba(255,255,255,0.35)">
  <Content />
</LiquidGlass>

// Note:
// - Default quality is 'low'.
// - 'extreme' produces the same visual fidelity as previous versions of this component.
// - For many instances on the same page, prefer quality='low' or autodetectquality.

Mobile Fallback Control

// Force CSS-only (strongest performance) even on desktop
<LiquidGlass mobileFallback="css-only" />

// Force SVG filter on mobile (may impact performance)
<LiquidGlass mobileFallback="svg" />

// Default behavior: CSS-only on mobile, SVG on desktop
<LiquidGlass />

Performance and Fallbacks

• Default behavior: on mobile devices the component uses a CSS-only effect to avoid jank; on desktop it uses the SVG filter.
• Quality presets: 'low' is the default and optimized for many instances; 'extreme' matches previous visuals.
• Autodetection: set autodetectquality to let the component choose a preset based on device performance.
• Effect Mode: use effectMode to force the strategy.

// Force CSS-only blur (no SVG) — recommended on very low-end devices
<LiquidGlass effectMode="blur" />

// Disable all filter effects (keeps border/frost/background)
<LiquidGlass effectMode="off" />

// Force SVG filter everywhere
<LiquidGlass effectMode="svg" />

Effect Mode Control

// Force pure CSS blur (no SVG) — ideal per dispositivi molto low-end
<LiquidGlass effectMode="blur" />

// Disattiva totalmente l'effetto (mantiene solo saturazione/frost)
<LiquidGlass effectMode="off" />

// Forza sempre l'SVG
<LiquidGlass effectMode="svg" />

// Selezione automatica (default)
<LiquidGlass effectMode="auto" />

Card with Glass Effect

<div className="card-container" style={{ 
  width: '350px', 
  height: '200px'
}}>
  <LiquidGlass 
    radius={15} 
    frost={0.15} 
    autoTextColor 
    background="linear-gradient(135deg, #667eea 0%, #764ba2 100%)"
  >
    <div style={{ padding: '24px', height: '100%' }}>
      <h3 style={{ marginBottom: '12px' }}>
        Glass Card
      </h3>
      <p>
        This is a beautiful glass morphism card with liquid distortion effects and gradient background.
      </p>
    </div>
  </LiquidGlass>
</div>

Overlay Effect

<div style={{ position: 'relative', width: '100%', height: '400px' }}>
  <img src="background.jpg" alt="Background" style={{ width: '100%', height: '100%', objectFit: 'cover' }} />
  
  <div style={{ 
    position: 'absolute', 
    top: '50%', 
    left: '50%', 
    transform: 'translate(-50%, -50%)',
    width: '300px',
    height: '150px'
  }}>
    <LiquidGlass autoTextColor background="rgba(255,255,255,0.4)">
      <div style={{ padding: '20px', textAlign: 'center' }}>
        <h2>Overlay Content</h2>
        <p>Glass effect over image</p>
      </div>
    </LiquidGlass>
  </div>
</div>

Browser Support

• Chrome (latest)
• Firefox (latest)
• Safari (latest)
• Edge (latest)

The component leverages modern CSS (backdrop-filter) and SVG filters. Older browsers may not support all effects.

Performance Tips

1. The component uses ResizeObserver to adapt to size changes efficiently
2. SVG filters are hardware-accelerated in modern browsers
3. For best performance, avoid animating the glass parameters rapidly
4. Use the preset mode for optimal default settings

Accessibility

• autoTextColor uses computed styles from the nearest opaque ancestor to decide between textOnDark and textOnLight. This helps maintain readable contrast automatically. You can set forceTextColor to enforce the computed color on deeply nested content.

Storybook

Run a live playground:

npm run storybook

Switch the Backgrounds toolbar between light/dark to see text color adapt in real time.

License

MIT © [lucaperullo]

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.

1. Fork the repository
2. Create your feature branch (git checkout -b feature/AmazingFeature)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -m 'Add some AmazingFeature')
4. Push to the branch (git push origin feature/AmazingFeature)
5. Open a Pull Request

Support

If you find this package helpful, please consider giving it a star on GitHub!

Keywords

react, react component, react ui, glassmorphism, glass morphism, liquid glass, liquid-glass, glass effect, frosted glass, frosted-glass, blur, blur effect, backdrop-filter, svg filter, displacement, displacement map, chromatic aberration, ui effects, card, overlay, glass ui, glass card, glass panel, glassmorphism react

For issues and feature requests, please create an issue.