Menubar
A desktop-app menu bar: once a menu is open, hovering or arrowing to its neighbours switches instantly, and a highlight glides between items with their shortcuts.
- Category: React Navigation Components
- Licence: Charcoal UI Pro
- Built with: React 19, Tailwind CSS 4, Motion
- Dependencies: motion, clsx, tailwind-merge
Examples
Menubar
API reference
| Prop | Type | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
menus | { label: string; items: MenubarItem[] }[] | — | Items are { label, shortcut?, disabled?, onSelect? } or "separator". |
className | string | — |
About Menubar
Menubar brings the desktop app menu bar to the web: once a menu is open, hovering or arrowing to its neighbours switches instantly, and a highlight glides between items with their shortcuts shown.
Menubar is a navigation component 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 Menubar
- Web editors and design tools.
- IDE-like developer tools.
- Admin apps with many commands.
- Desktop apps built with web tech.
How it works
It follows the menubar pattern: Left and Right move between menus, Down opens one, Up and Down move through items, and Escape closes back to the trigger. Outside clicks close it.
Links and buttons keep their roles, arrow keys move where a group is expected, the current item is marked with aria-current, and focus is always visible. With prefers-reduced-motion on, it holds still or settles instantly instead of animating.
Customizing Menubar
Every prop is documented in the API reference above with its type and default. The ones you will reach for first are listed here.
Style it with className like any other element. It only uses your theme's tokens, so it follows light and dark mode without extra work.
- menus: Items are { label, shortcut?, disabled?, onSelect? } or "separator".
Goes well with Menubar
These navigation pieces share its tokens and motion language, so they sit together on one page without clashing.
- Dock: A macOS-style React dock whose icons swell with pointer distance and show labels
- Expandable Tabs: Compact React icon tabs where the active tab expands to reveal its label
- Floating Nav: A floating React pill nav that hides on scroll down and returns on scroll up
- Context Menu: A React right-click context menu that opens at the pointer and stays on screen
- Bottom Nav: An animated React mobile tab bar with a sliding pill, hopping icons and badges
Install Menubar
npx shadcn@latest add @charcoal/menubarMenubar 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 menubar.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 Menubar?
- Menubar is part of Charcoal UI Pro. Add the @charcoal registry to components.json with your access token, then run npx shadcn@latest add @charcoal/menubar. It copies menubar.tsx into components/ui and installs motion, clsx, tailwind-merge.
- Is Menubar free for commercial use?
- Menubar 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 Menubar 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 Menubar?
- Yes. Connect the Charcoal UI MCP server (https://charcoalui.com/mcp) to Claude Code, Cursor or any MCP client; get_component returns Menubar's props and get_install_command returns the exact command.