CrossUI is a free, cross-browser JavaScript framework for building rich single-page web applications, paired with a visual editor that writes edits directly into your real React source code.

What it is

CrossUI is an open-source JavaScript framework and a family of related front-end tools, living in the web development ecosystem alongside React and MUI. The framework provides a rich client-side API that works with any backend or with static HTML pages, ships more than 100 GUI components, and supports reusable modules; the companion CrossUI Studio is a visual editor that operates on React plus MUI through an AST rather than through a generated artifact.

The concrete problem it addresses is the disconnect between visual builders and real source control. Because every change in Studio is a single atomic write to one node in the React AST, changing one prop produces a one-line git diff with the surrounding lines left byte-for-byte identical, so a team can actually review it. This replaces the usual codegen workflow in which the tool owns a proprietary document or SDK: the React code remains the source of truth, and deleting Studio leaves a repository that still builds with npm install && npm run build.

Key capabilities

• Provides more than 100 web GUI components, including Tabs, Dialog, TreeGrid, SVG Shapes and Chart, with a full API documentation set backed by numerous samples.
• Binds web services in JSON, XML and SOAP formats directly to the client-side API, with backend service code available for PHP, C# and Java.
• Targets wide cross-browser compatibility, listing IE6+, Firefox 3+, Opera 9+, Safari 3+ and Google Chrome.
• Edits React 18, React 19 and Canary projects with MUI v7 and shadcn, writing to the original AST position so hooks, custom logic, comments and formatting come out unchanged.
• Performs deep-layer editing by drilling past the outermost render into a .map() iteration, a ternary branch, or a node passed as children, synthesizing type-correct mock data so the node renders without its parent's runtime context.
• Includes an Import Graph (v0.9.5) that sets any file as the entry point and draws its full dependency map, showing circular dependencies in red; because it is built from static AST analysis, the graph renders even when the component itself crashes.
• Works with GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, Azure, Gitea and Forgejo repositories, including self-hosted instances.

Who uses it and how

• Front-end teams that need reviewable visual editing, touching a variant on the canvas and committing a one-line diff into their existing repository.
• Developers who use the full editor for free on an in-browser virtual repo, mounting real Git repositories only under the Pro tier.
• Builders who use the companion no-code tools — CrossUI React builder, the front-end builder integrated with a GitHub repository, the Single Page Builder, Embeddable Designer, Theme Roller, Form Builder and JSON Editor — to reduce development time.
• Teams needing desktop versions, served alongside examples, tutorials and a blog, plus CDN-hosted runtime files.

Getting started

The framework runtime is served directly from the CDN at https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/gh/linb/CrossUI@latest/runtime/xui/js/xui-all.js (or https://crossui.com/libs/3.0/js/xui-all.js), and Studio can be tried immediately in the browser at studio.crossui.com, with desktop versions available from the downloads page.

How it compares

The facts name React, MUI and shadcn as the technologies Studio operates on rather than as competing framework or editor products, and they do not list any comparable standalone tools. CrossUI therefore stands alone in this registry as a self-hostable, free-to-use entry for this kind of cross-browser and AST-based visual development work.

When to use it — and when not to

A user should note that the registry metadata lists an MIT licence while the README states the framework is released under LGPL3, so the applicable licence should be confirmed before adoption; real Git mounts and the full workflow beyond the in-browser virtual repo require the paid Pro tier. It is a poor fit for teams whose work is entirely modern-browser and who have no need for the IE6-era compatibility range, and for anyone unwilling to verify the licence discrepancy first.