Glyph Rain
Columns of glyphs falling at their own pace, each led by a bright head with a fading trail of colour behind it. Bring your own characters. Canvas, written in the file.
- Category: Animated React Backgrounds
- Licence: Charcoal UI Pro
- Built with: React 19, Tailwind CSS 4, Motion
- Dependencies: motion, clsx, tailwind-merge
Examples
Glyph Rain
API reference
| Prop | Type | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
glyphs | string | — | |
fontSize | number | 14 | |
speed | number | 1 | 0 holds still. |
color | string | "var(--ember)" | |
className | string | — |
About Glyph Rain
Glyph Rain drops columns of characters at their own pace, each led by a bright head with a fading trail of colour behind it. Bring your own characters for a brand, a language or a codebase.
Glyph Rain is an animated background for React 19, styled with Tailwind CSS 4 and animated with Motion. It drops into Next.js, Vite, Remix or Astro through the shadcn CLI as a single file you own.
When to use Glyph Rain
- Developer and hacker aesthetics.
- Security product heroes.
- Terminal-style 404 pages.
- Event and conference visuals.
How it works
Each column advances in whole-character steps on its own clock, and the trail is a gentle fade of the previous frame. It draws on a 2D canvas and pauses when off screen.
The whole layer is decorative and aria-hidden, sits behind your content without taking pointer events it does not need, and pauses when scrolled off screen. With prefers-reduced-motion on, it holds still or settles instantly instead of animating.
Customizing Glyph Rain
Every prop is documented in the API reference above with its type and default. The ones you will reach for first are listed here.
The Customize panel next to the preview lets you change fontSize, speed, color live, and the Code tab updates to match, so the snippet you copy already carries your values.
- glyphs (string).
- fontSize (number, default 14).
- speed (number, default 1): 0 holds still.
- color (string, default "var(--ember)").
Goes well with Glyph Rain
These backgrounds pieces share its tokens and motion language, so they sit together on one page without clashing.
- Ember Field: An animated React ember background: glowing embers drift up and flicker as they cool
- Smoke: A slow React smoke background: blurred plumes drifting over dark sections, CSS only
- Aurora: An animated React aurora background: soft light bands drifting across a section
- Grid Beams: A React grid background with beams of light running along its lines
- Meteors: A React meteor shower background: streaks falling diagonally, CSS only
Install Glyph Rain
npx shadcn@latest add @charcoal/glyph-rainGlyph Rain is part of Charcoal UI Pro. One seat unlocks all 393 Pro components, 112 landing-page sections and 100 full templates, for every personal and client project, with updates included. Add the @charcoal registry once with your access token, then the command above copies glyph-rain.tsx into components/ui and installs clsx, tailwind-merge.
You own the file you install: no runtime package, no lock-in, nothing to keep in sync. Change it however your product needs.
See Charcoal UI Pro pricing · Pro setup
Frequently asked questions
- How do I install Glyph Rain?
- Glyph Rain is part of Charcoal UI Pro. Add the @charcoal registry to components.json with your access token, then run npx shadcn@latest add @charcoal/glyph-rain. It copies glyph-rain.tsx into components/ui and installs motion, clsx, tailwind-merge.
- Is Glyph Rain free for commercial use?
- Glyph Rain needs a Charcoal UI Pro seat, monthly or a one-time lifetime price. A seat covers unlimited personal and commercial projects, including client work, and every future Pro component.
- Does Glyph Rain work with Next.js?
- Yes. It is a client component for React 19 styled with Tailwind CSS 4, so it works in the Next.js App Router and Pages Router, Vite, Remix and Astro.
- Can an AI coding agent install Glyph Rain?
- Yes. Connect the Charcoal UI MCP server (https://charcoalui.com/mcp) to Claude Code, Cursor or any MCP client; get_component returns Glyph Rain's props and get_install_command returns the exact command.