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CSS Next VS CSS Modules

Compare CSS Next VS CSS Modules and see what are their differences

CSS Next logo CSS Next

Use tomorrow’s CSS syntax, today.

CSS Modules logo CSS Modules

I’ve been intrigued by CSS Modules lately. If you haven't heard of them, this post is for you. We'll be looking at the project and it's goals and aims. If
  • CSS Next Landing page
    Landing page //
    2019-02-22
  • CSS Modules Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-02-21

CSS Next features and specs

  • Future CSS Features
    CSS Next allows developers to use the latest CSS syntax and features that may not yet be supported by all browsers, enabling progressive enhancement and future-proofing stylesheets.
  • Simplified Syntax
    By using future CSS features, developers can write more concise and expressive code, making stylesheets easier to read and maintain.
  • Polyfills and Transpilation
    CSS Next automatically provides polyfills and transpiles CSS so that the latest features can be used even in environments that do not yet support them natively.
  • Improved Workflow
    With CSS Next, developers can directly utilize tools that help improve styling workflows, such as variables, custom selectors, and media queries, more conveniently.

Possible disadvantages of CSS Next

  • Dependency on Tooling
    CSS Next requires a build process for transpilation, which adds complexity and dependencies to project setup and maintenance.
  • Potential Performance Overhead
    The polyfills and transpilation process can introduce a performance overhead during development and build times, affecting the speed of initial setup.
  • Limited Support for Older Browsers
    While CSS Next helps bring future features to more browsers, it might not fully support significantly older browsers, necessitating additional fallbacks or workarounds.
  • Project Activity and Maintenance
    Due to changes in the web development landscape and focus shifts, CSS Next might not be actively maintained, potentially leading developers to use alternatives like PostCSS or native CSS features as they become available.

CSS Modules features and specs

No features have been listed yet.

CSS Next videos

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CSS Modules videos

Josh Johnston: At Least 6 Ways to Win with CSS Modules

More videos:

  • Review - Styling React Components with CSS Modules | Styling react with CSS Classes | Data Is Good
  • Review - Styling LitElement views part 2: global styles and CSS modules (Vaadin Fusion)

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to CSS Next and CSS Modules)
Developer Tools
59 59%
41% 41
CSS Framework
53 53%
47% 47
Design Tools
55 55%
45% 45
Productivity
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

Share your experience with using CSS Next and CSS Modules. For example, how are they different and which one is better?
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Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, CSS Modules should be more popular than CSS Next. It has been mentiond 12 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

CSS Next mentions (2)

  • PostCSS - my initial experience
    The author of the most popular PostCSS plugin himself recommended the postcss-preset-env over his own creation which is cssnex, and. - Source: dev.to / over 2 years ago
  • Vanilla+PostCSS as an Alternative to SCSS
    Switching from a ready-made tool like Sass or a recommendation package like cssnext (deprecated since 2019) or PostCSS Preset Env (archived in 2022), to the modular PostCSS Preset Env plugin set we can choose a helpful and convenient set of future CSS features beyond the current stable client CSS. - Source: dev.to / about 2 years ago

CSS Modules mentions (12)

  • On why I prefer not to use elm-css
    ..., CSS Modules, CSS-in-JS, and Tailwind when I'm not constrained to do so. - Source: dev.to / 6 months ago
  • Is there really no better way to isolate styles across components than CSS modules?
    From what I read about CSS modules, the style isolation provides some guard rails to prevent things like random bits of global style or having colliding rules all over the place. This makes a lot of sense, but even on huge projects, I never really have those problems. I've disciplined myself to pair a component file with a CSS file (MyComponent.jsx + MyComponent.css) and keep global styles to a minimum. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Components with separate styles - how to do?
    Any time you import CSS files into a module, that CSS becomes active on EVERY component in your entire project, so that's not really a good way to go about it. It essentially creates a tag inside the final rendered html with all of your CSS within it. If you have two CSS files, and they both have a class of .myClass then they will step on each other and cause bad things to happen to your... Source: over 2 years ago
  • Why do bigger websites have the weirdest class and id names?
    They are probably using css modules. Source: over 2 years ago
  • No Caption..
    This may be a little more advanced but I'd also recommend looking into CSS modules. It basically allows you to scope your styles to individual elements preventing unwanted cascading, and simplifies naming conventions a lot (since the class names are now variables). Source: over 2 years ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing CSS Next and CSS Modules, you can also consider the following products

PostCSS - Increase code readability. Add vendor prefixes to CSS rules using values from Can I Use. Autoprefixer will use the data based on current browser popularity and property support to apply prefixes for you.

styled-components - styled-components is a visual primitive for the component age that also helps the user to use the ES6 and CSS to style apps.

Stylecow - CSS processor to fix your css code and make it compatible with all browsers

Sass - Syntatically Awesome Style Sheets

Stylus - EXPRESSIVE, DYNAMIC, ROBUST CSS

Autoprefixer - autoprefixer - Parse CSS and add vendor prefixes to rules by Can I Use