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Tailwind CSS VS jQuery Mobile

Compare Tailwind CSS VS jQuery Mobile and see what are their differences

Tailwind CSS logo Tailwind CSS

A utility-first CSS framework for rapidly building custom user interfaces.

jQuery Mobile logo jQuery Mobile

jQuery Mobile
  • Tailwind CSS Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-05-13
  • jQuery Mobile Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-10-17

Tailwind CSS features and specs

  • Utility-First Approach
    Tailwind CSS uses a utility-first approach, promoting the use of small, reusable utility classes to style elements directly in your markup. This can lead to more readable and maintainable HTML.
  • Customization
    The framework is highly customizable. You can easily configure its default theme, add your extensions, and create custom utilities. Tailwind’s config file allows for deep customization of all aspects of the framework.
  • Consistent Design
    Using utility classes ensures design consistency because the same classes will apply the same styles globally.
  • Responsive Design
    Tailwind CSS has excellent built-in support for responsive design. You can easily apply different styles for different screen sizes using responsive utility variants.
  • Performance
    Tailwind purges unused CSS in production, resulting in smaller final output files and improved performance.
  • Integrates Well with Frameworks
    Tailwind CSS integrates smoothly with modern JavaScript frameworks like React, Vue, and Angular.
  • JIT Compiler
    The Just-in-Time (JIT) mode in Tailwind CSS generates styles on-demand, reducing the development build sizes and speeding up the development process.

Possible disadvantages of Tailwind CSS

  • Steep Learning Curve
    For developers coming from traditional CSS or other CSS frameworks, getting used to Tailwind's utility-first approach may take some time.
  • HTML Congestion
    Due to the utility-first approach, HTML files can get filled with numerous utility classes, making it look cluttered and harder to read.
  • Initial Setup
    Setting up Tailwind CSS initially can be complex, especially for beginners. Configuration settings and integrations with build tools can be confusing.
  • Verbosity
    Some developers find the inline utility classes verbose, particularly when complex styles are required, which can lead to bloated template files.
  • Limited Abstractions
    Tailwind doesn't provide higher-level abstractions such as components out of the box, like other frameworks (e.g., Bootstrap) do. Developers need to build and maintain these abstractions themselves.
  • Dependency Tailoring
    While Tailwind aims to be minimalistic, it may enforce some dependencies or build tool integrations that could be unnecessary for very simple projects.

jQuery Mobile features and specs

  • Cross-Platform Compatibility
    jQuery Mobile provides a unified user interface across multiple devices and platforms, making it easier to create applications that work seamlessly on both iOS and Android.
  • Ease of Use
    With a familiar syntax for those who have used jQuery, jQuery Mobile makes it easy to get started with mobile web development. Its straightforward API and comprehensive documentation further aid in rapid development.
  • Theme Customization
    The jQuery Mobile ThemeRoller allows developers to customize the look and feel of their mobile websites easily. Multiple built-in themes are available, and they can be modified or new themes can be created.
  • Extensive UI Components
    jQuery Mobile comes with a wide range of UI components such as buttons, dialogs, sliders, and more. These components are touch-optimized and ready to use, allowing for quicker development.
  • Accessibility
    The framework is designed with accessibility in mind, providing support for ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) guidelines and ensuring that applications are usable by people with disabilities.

Possible disadvantages of jQuery Mobile

  • Performance Issues
    jQuery Mobile can sometimes be slower than native mobile applications or other frameworks, especially on older devices. This is due to its heavy reliance on JavaScript and extensive DOM manipulations.
  • Limited Customizability
    While ThemeRoller offers considerable customization options, deep customizations can be challenging. This can make it difficult to achieve a unique look and feel without extensive CSS overrides.
  • Dependency on jQuery
    Since jQuery Mobile is built on top of jQuery, any limitations or issues in jQuery affect jQuery Mobile as well. Additionally, including the full jQuery library increases the overall load size, impacting performance.
  • Outdated Technology
    As web technologies have advanced, some developers consider jQuery Mobile to be outdated compared to newer frameworks like React Native or Flutter, which offer more robust and scalable options for mobile development.
  • Smaller Community
    The community around jQuery Mobile is smaller compared to other popular mobile development frameworks. This can lead to less frequent updates, fewer third-party plugins, and limited support.

Tailwind CSS videos

Why I Don't Like Tailwind CSS

More videos:

  • Review - Vanilla CSS vs Bootstrap vs Tailwind CSS - Which one should you choose?
  • Review - Get Started with Tailwind CSS in 15 Minutes

jQuery Mobile videos

jQuery Mobile Review

More videos:

  • Review - jQuery Mobile Book Reviews jQuery Mobile - First Look and jQuery Mobile Up and Running

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Tailwind CSS and jQuery Mobile)
Developer Tools
97 97%
3% 3
Development Tools
0 0%
100% 100
Design Tools
100 100%
0% 0
JavaScript Framework
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Tailwind CSS and jQuery Mobile

Tailwind CSS Reviews

  1. Awesome framework

    I use it in all my current projects. It's easy to start and very customisable. Love it so much! I improved the speed of development 2x times by using Tailwind.


22 Best Bootstrap Alternatives & What Each Is Best For
Tailwind CSS comes with features such as responsive design, customizability, hover, focus, and active states out of the box. These enable developers to build sophisticated, interactive interfaces with ease. When it comes to integrations, Tailwind CSS can be integrated with popular front-end frameworks like React, Vue, and Angular, enhancing its utility across different...
Source: thectoclub.com
15 Top Bootstrap Alternatives For Frontend Developers in 2024
If you want to learn the valuable skill of Tailwind CSS, we highly recommend taking the "Tailwind CSS From Scratch" course by Brad Traversy on Udemy. In this introductory course, you will build great-looking layouts quickly and efficiently using Tailwind CSS utility classes.
Source: coursesity.com
10 Best Free React UI Libraries in 2023
TailwindCSS is a utility-first CSS framework designed to build modern and beautiful websites in no time. Here, utility class names define what to do. Each utility class comes with pre-defined CSS properties.
11 Best Material UI Alternatives
Tailwind CSS promotes a modular approach to styling, where devs can combine classes to create unique and responsive designs. It offers utilities for layout, typography, colors, spacing, and more, allowing developers to create consistent and visually appealing interfaces with minimal effort.
Source: www.uxpin.com
Top 10 Best CSS Frameworks for Front-End Developers in 2022
Tailwind enables faster development of the front-end. Instead of a default theme or built-in UI components, you’d get pre-designed widget menus and utility classes to build your website. Tailwind has modular components, and if you make changes in one place, other parts of your code won’t get impacted. Tailwind requires the least amount of learning and is easy to use. You can...
Source: hackr.io

jQuery Mobile Reviews

Top JavaScript Frameworks For Mobile App Development
jQuery Mobile is a leading user interface framework, created on jQuery core and based on JavaScript programming. It is lightweight in size, with a strong theming framework and simple API that facilitates the creation of highly responsive mobile applications and powerful websites. It designs single good quality websites and applications that can work seamlessly on devices and...
Source: medium.com
9 Top JavaScript Mobile Frameworks To Know In 2020
jQuery Mobile supports a number of user interfaces that are compatible with modern platforms such as Android, iOS and to the earliest of platforms such as Opera Mini and Nokia Symbian. With the help of PhoneGap, you can integrate your jQuery web app code to an interactive iOS or Android application.

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Tailwind CSS seems to be a lot more popular than jQuery Mobile. While we know about 1015 links to Tailwind CSS, we've tracked only 3 mentions of jQuery Mobile. 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.

Tailwind CSS mentions (1015)

  • How to add markdown to a Next.js project
    This article assumes the reader is a developer that knows their way around Markdown, TypeScript, React.js, and [Next.js] https://nextjs.org/). Familiarity with Tailwind-css would also be useful. - Source: dev.to / 13 days ago
  • SonicScan - A Music Fingerprinting and Identification App
    Then I learned Tauri and used my favourite frontend framework SolidJS with TailwindCSS and DaisyUI to build the UI with MotionOne to add animations and Tauri to build the desktop/web/android/ios app. - Source: dev.to / 15 days ago
  • Top 5 Free React UI Libraries to Use in 2025
    Shadcn/ui contains a set of beautifully designed and accessible components, and it works seamlessly with major React frameworks. It’s open-source and has amassed 85.5k (and counting) GitHub stars. It’s built on the shoulders of giants — Radix UI and Tailwind CSS, making it one of the best to work with. Unlike many other UI libraries, the components are not just installed as npm modules, they’re downloaded into... - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
  • Tailwind vs Linaria: Performance Investigation
    We're going to investigate the difference in performance between Tailwind and Linaria. Tailwind, you already know. And Linaria has been getting quite a lot of traction since styled components went into maintenance mode recently. We'll cover why Linaria is a good choice for this comparison a bit further. - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
  • How to Integrate Tailwind with 11ty – With Code Examples
    It is a well-known fact that Tailwind CSS is a utility-first CSS framework. It lets you style elements directly within your HTML, thanks to pre-defined classes. Unlike other CSS frameworks that offer pre-built components, Tailwind offers these low-level utility classes that let you create your own design system. Thus, this makes crafting unique responsive designs effortless as there is not much to do with custom CSS. - Source: dev.to / about 2 months ago
View more

jQuery Mobile mentions (3)

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Tailwind CSS and jQuery Mobile, you can also consider the following products

Bootstrap - Simple and flexible HTML, CSS, and JS for popular UI components and interactions

Onsen UI - HTML5 Hybrid Mobile App UI Framework - work with Angular, React, Vue, Meteor & pure JavaScript. Material & Flat design.

Bulma - Bulma is an open source CSS framework based on Flexbox and built with Sass. It's 100% responsive, fully modular, and available for free.

React - A JavaScript library for building user interfaces

React Native - A framework for building native apps with React

Materialize CSS - A modern responsive front-end framework based on Material Design