Sidebar

Installation

npx lovdacn@latest add sidebar

(You can also use the shortened lvcn alias, e.g., npx lvcn@latest add sidebar.)

Registry dependencies: icon, separator, skeleton, text, utils

Usage

Wrap your screen in SidebarProvider, then place a Sidebar next to a SidebarInset. On phones the sidebar becomes an off-canvas drawer toggled by SidebarTrigger; on wider screens it collapses in place.

import {
  Sidebar,
  SidebarContent,
  SidebarGroup,
  SidebarGroupContent,
  SidebarGroupLabel,
  SidebarInset,
  SidebarMenu,
  SidebarMenuButton,
  SidebarMenuItem,
  SidebarProvider,
  SidebarTrigger,
} from "@/components/ui/sidebar"
import { Icon } from "@/components/ui/icon"
import { Text } from "@/components/ui/text"
import { LayoutDashboard, Settings } from "lucide-react-native"
import { View } from "react-native"

export function AppShell() {
  return (
    <SidebarProvider>
      <Sidebar collapsible="offcanvas">
        <SidebarContent>
          <SidebarGroup>
            <SidebarGroupLabel>Platform</SidebarGroupLabel>
            <SidebarGroupContent>
              <SidebarMenu>
                <SidebarMenuItem>
                  <SidebarMenuButton isActive onPress={() => {}}>
                    <Icon as={LayoutDashboard} className="size-4" />
                    <Text className="flex-1">Dashboard</Text>
                  </SidebarMenuButton>
                </SidebarMenuItem>
                <SidebarMenuItem>
                  <SidebarMenuButton onPress={() => {}}>
                    <Icon as={Settings} className="size-4" />
                    <Text className="flex-1">Settings</Text>
                  </SidebarMenuButton>
                </SidebarMenuItem>
              </SidebarMenu>
            </SidebarGroupContent>
          </SidebarGroup>
        </SidebarContent>
      </Sidebar>

      <SidebarInset>
        <View className="flex-row items-center gap-2 border-b border-border p-4">
          <SidebarTrigger />
          <Text className="text-base font-semibold">Dashboard</Text>
        </View>
        {/* your screen content */}
      </SidebarInset>
    </SidebarProvider>
  )
}

Anatomy

Responsive behavior

• Mobile (< 768px) — the sidebar renders as an animated off-canvas drawer with a backdrop. Opening it overlays (and overrides) the rest of the screen, including a bottom tab bar.
• Desktop — the sidebar is an in-flow column that animates its width when toggled (offcanvas hides it; icon collapses to an icon rail).

Complexity: mobile vs. desktop

A sidebar means very different things on a wide screen versus a phone, and most of the component's work is reconciling the two.

Desktop

• Space is plentiful, so the sidebar is persistent — an in-flow column that's always visible and can collapse to a narrow icon rail (collapsible="icon") or slide away (offcanvas).
• It's typically the primary navigation; width animates on toggle, and content reflows beside it (SidebarInset).

Mobile

• There's no room for a persistent column, so the sidebar becomes an off-canvas drawer — an absolutely-positioned overlay with a dimmed backdrop that animates in over the screen.
• The hard parts: animating transform/opacity smoothly, trapping taps behind a scrim, honoring safe-area insets, and making the drawer override other chrome (like a bottom tab bar) while it's open.

Best methods

• Let the breakpoint drive it. SidebarProvider switches to drawer mode under 768px automatically; you write the layout once.

• Pair the drawer with a bottom tab bar. On phones, put 3–5 primary destinations in a bottom navbar and use the sidebar drawer for secondary items (workspaces, settings, account). When the drawer opens it overlays — and should hide — the bottom bar. In this library's blocks that's done by reading openMobile from useSidebar():

  function BottomNav() {
    const { openMobile } = useSidebar()
    if (openMobile) return null // sidebar overrides the bottom navbar when active
    // …tab bar…
  }

• Keep labels on touch. Avoid collapsible="icon" on phones — icon-only targets are ambiguous without a tooltip. Prefer full-width rows with a label.

• Respect insets. Pad SidebarHeader and the top bar with the top inset, and the drawer/bottom bar with the bottom inset (react-native-safe-area-context).

• Constrain the drawer. Keep it ≲ 85% of screen width and dim the backdrop so the underlying screen reads as inactive.

Platform

Targets Expo / React Native with NativeWind or Uniwind. The drawer and width transitions use React Native's Animated, and it is built on semantic theme tokens so it adapts to every lvcn style pack.