JetBrains has introduced the first technology preview of Jetpack Compose for the Web, bringing Google’s popular Kotlin toolkit for building reactive user interfaces to web development. This new extension expands Jetpack Compose’s reach, which was initially designed for Android and desktop applications, to now include web-based projects, giving developers more flexibility in creating unified UIs across multiple platforms.
Launched on May 3, Jetpack Compose for Web builds on Kotlin Multiplatform, a framework that enables developers to write platform-agnostic code. This allows the sharing of core functionality, such as business logic, across Android, desktop, and web platforms. Developers can now utilize Jetpack Compose as the UI framework for all three, reducing the need for separate codebases while still providing the ability to tailor platform-specific functionality where necessary.
Jetpack Compose for Web complements JetBrains’ existing Compose for Desktop, which enables the creation of reactive desktop UIs using Kotlin. Both projects are in early development, with a 1.0 release planned for future updates. While Jetpack Compose for Web is still in preview, it introduces a crucial benefit: developers can apply core Compose state management concepts across Android, desktop, and web platforms, ensuring a consistent and efficient development experience.
However, it’s important to note that the preview version doesn’t allow developers to directly reuse existing widgets across platforms. Instead, the expect/actual mechanism in Kotlin Multiplatform can be used to create common widgets, with platform-specific implementations for Android, desktop, and web. This feature highlights the flexibility and power of Jetpack Compose for Web, making it easier for developers to adopt Kotlin across different platforms while keeping UI development streamlined and maintainable.