[joy-ui] Release Cycle

[jd-carroll]

Steps to reproduce

There have been 14 @mui/material releases since the last @mui/joy@5.0.0-beta.48 release. Obviously they are different release trains, so I'm not expecting 14 @mui/joy releases.

However, considering that it has been close to 4months since the last release and there have been major changes (i.e. @mui/system@6.0.0 to joy's underlying dependencies, I'm left wondering what the status of joy is... ?

Hoping that it is not abandoned, will there be a release soon? (Is there an issue or tracker I can follow to monitor / contribute progress towards that?)

If it is abandoned, any guidance on replacement / migration steps?

Current behavior

No response

Expected behavior

No response

Context

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Your environment

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Search keywords: joy release cycle

[siriwatknp]

Thanks for reporting the issue! Joy UI development is temporarily on hold as the maintainers focus on the next two major releases of Material UI

[viktorblondal]

It would be a shame if this project didn't get ongoing support. Such a great project! ❤️

When starting a new project from scratch, we recommend Material UI over Joy UI because we can guarantee ongoing support.

[Studio384]

Thanks for reporting the issue! Joy UI development is temporarily on hold as the maintainers focus on the next two major releases of Material UI

This is the same thing that was said almost exactly a year ago now and since then MUI v6 has been released. In that same blog post we also were told we'd get an update in 2024 Q2 but that never happened as far as I'm aware. Will that be talked about in the upcoming announcement about MUI v7 and v8?

[EfstathiadisD]

Yeah. I agree! Said it before! V6 was needed but Joy UI is an excellent product! It needs a major release with more than just React 19 Support!

That should be in minor! We need some fixes and above all else a clear roadmap for this package!

I was happy to give the benefit of the doubt to the team but you pushed back almost a Year now your own words!

It's not good! We need a roadmap, and a stable release with some bug fixes!

This is an excellent product and IMHO it should have taken prio over MUI but you know better.

Still it's not professional to say we will look at it in 6 Months 3 times in a row!

It's been over a Year now and the way y talk 2025 will pass and still nothing. Disappointed!

[Westo48]

This project simply seems to be abandoned outside of React support which is sad because everywhere I see people talk about it they like Joy UI more than MUI from a design perspective.

[atillaaliyev]

This uncertainty is not good. I have designed new library based on Mui/Joy for all developers that there are over 45+ components. Moreover, the company will use this library for whole projects so I'm worried. Maybe, Joy UI could become a theme of Material UI but the theme isn't the only problem. For instance, how will you manage props of Dialog component? There are differences between Joy and Mui. I feel like I made a mistake because of choosing Joy.

[EfstathiadisD]

I am gonna be honest. I understand how people feel. We just switched to Joy a few Months back.

I don't regret it. Time will tell. The theme is excellent. MUI would require me so much custom work to get what I need.

Joy theme is pure work of art! The component structure is better and the performance as well.

I think the team made a mistake tech wise. Brand value of MUI is immense but they could port JoyUI theming capabilities and branded it as MUI for MUI v6.

They bet on MUI which cost them 1.5 Years and still no MD3 (Don't are personally) and left such a capable lib behind!

Hope JoyUI gets some love soon. I would be happy to support of few fixes and improvements but I see even PR review don't get any support or review get rubbed off. That's just bad attitude.

I think they are betting big in MUI but just like NextJS it is going to take double the time they envisioned and now feel they can't back out.

[Studio384]

Well, apparently, Joy UI is as good as dead. They expect users to migrate to MUI when v8 comes out.

I am frankly growing distrustful of MUIs roadmap. Between having been told for an entire year that development would be picked up again up, now both Joy UI and Base UI v5 having been turned into a dead end, and the strange indecisiveness and misaligned planning on whether the latest MUI X was going to support the latest MUI version, my faith in MUI as a whole is rapidly falling apart.

I love the library, have been a long time user of Material UI, Joy UI and Base UI (and recently began exploring the new Base UI). The API for these packages is just amazing to me... But every major release seems to be an attempt to pull the project in a different direction and before that vision is finished, the direction has changed again.

After splitting MUI v6 into v6 and v7, MUI v7 has now been split into MUI v7 and v8, with the Material Design 3 update seemingly planned for v8, but no clear announcement for this, just a brief passing mention that v7 won't include major visual changes. But while that blog post seems to imply MD3 is still the plan, this tweet from last week seems to imply that he plan is to drop Material Design altogether.

Meanwhile, the Base UI documentation still links to v5 and the MUI website completely ignores that Base UI v1 (why is this even v1 again?) exists. So I'd assume new users are still implied to start with v5, but since that's just a dead end and the migration to Base UI v1 seems extremely painful, this seems like a bad recommendation. The only indication to all of this is a warning on the Overview page of the Base UI documentation that links to a blog post, where you have to scroll all the way down then notice a link to the new repository which has a link to the new documentation.

IMO this all shows that MUI has some serious issues with communication, both towards the community (e.g. the state of Joy UI) as well as between different projects within MUI (e.g. MUI and MUI X being seemingly unaware of who's gonna support what, which Base UI is the right Base UI). It's like members of the team aren't even aware of the plans of their own teams.

Plans change, I get that, that is to be expected, but when they do, please communicate that properly and be honest with the users that have decided to put their trust (and money) in you and rely on your packages. That - I feel - is sorely missing here.

Because frankly, I don't know what to do here anymore. We're starting a brand new project from the ground up and are exploring some potential packages (including Base UI). Am I to put my faith in Base UI (v1)? Because this is starting to feel like I'm gambling that I won't end up at a dead end, and looking elsewhere - even if I like the API less - is a much more safe bet.

[siriwatknp]

@Studio384 Thank you for raising these concerns about Joy UI. I want to provide full transparency about our journey and future direction.

Joy UI emerged from our efforts (#22485) to modernize Material Design while maintaining the customization capabilities that developers love. We initially created it as a separate package to explore new features without impacting Material UI's stability. However, managing both packages with our current resources proved challenging, and we noticed that our focus on Joy UI had slowed Material UI's development. While Joy UI's adoption remained relatively small compared to Material UI, it introduced valuable improvements in both aesthetics and customization.

Rather than discontinuing Joy UI, we're planning to incorporate its best features into Material UI v8, building on the foundation of our new Base UI framework.

To set clear expectations: Material UI v7 will maintain the current Material Design principles. Version 8 will mark a significant evolution, moving beyond Material Design 2 and integrating Base UI. While this transition will involve design changes, we're committed to sharing our v8 design direction as soon as possible to help teams prepare for the update.

I hope this clarify the concerns.

[viktorblondal]

Rather than discontinuing Joy UI, we're planning to incorporate its best features into Material UI v8, building on the foundation of our new Base UI framework.

So... you ARE discontinuing Joy? Got it.

[jd-carroll]

I guess we'll look forward to those design decisions / communications. Thank you!

[github-actions]

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