Material Design 3 — Ink (React CLI)

Overview

Ink is a React renderer for building interactive command-line interfaces. Combined with @inkjs/ui, it provides themeable CLI components. M3 design tokens can be mapped to terminal colors for consistent, Material-styled CLI experiences.

Keywords: Material Design 3, M3, Ink, CLI, terminal, command-line, @inkjs/ui, React CLI, terminal UI

When to Use

• Node.js CLI tools and developer tooling
• Interactive terminal applications
• When you want M3-consistent styling in the terminal
• React-based CLI projects

Install

npm install ink react @inkjs/ui

M3 Theme Setup

Map M3 tokens to terminal colors:

// m3-theme.js
export const m3Theme = {
  colors: {
    primary: '#6750A4',
    onPrimary: '#FFFFFF',
    secondary: '#625B71',
    tertiary: '#7D5260',
    error: '#B3261E',
    surface: '#FEF7FF',
    onSurface: '#1D1B20',
    outline: '#79747E',
    // Terminal-friendly named colors (for broader compatibility)
    primaryTerminal: 'magenta',
    secondaryTerminal: 'gray',
    errorTerminal: 'red',
    successTerminal: 'green',
  },
};

// For dark terminal backgrounds
export const m3ThemeDark = {
  colors: {
    primary: '#D0BCFF',
    onPrimary: '#381E72',
    secondary: '#CCC2DC',
    error: '#F2B8B5',
    surface: '#141218',
    onSurface: '#E6E0E9',
    primaryTerminal: 'magentaBright',
    errorTerminal: 'redBright',
  },
};

Component Examples

Full App with M3 Tokens

import React from 'react';
import {render, Box, Text} from 'ink';
import {TextInput, Select, Spinner, Badge} from '@inkjs/ui';
import {m3Theme} from './m3-theme.js';

function App() {
  return (
    <Box flexDirection="column" padding={1} gap={1}>
      {/* M3 Primary colored heading */}
      <Text color={m3Theme.colors.primary} bold>
        ✦ Material Design 3 CLI
      </Text>

      {/* M3 Surface container */}
      <Box
        borderStyle="round"
        borderColor={m3Theme.colors.outline}
        paddingX={2}
        paddingY={1}
        flexDirection="column"
        gap={1}
      >
        <Text color={m3Theme.colors.onSurface}>
          Welcome to the M3-styled terminal
        </Text>

        <TextInput
          placeholder="Enter your name..."
          onSubmit={name => {}}
        />

        <Select
          options={[
            {label: 'Option 1', value: '1'},
            {label: 'Option 2', value: '2'},
          ]}
          onChange={value => {}}
        />
      </Box>

      {/* M3 Status indicators */}
      <Box gap={1}>
        <Badge color="green">Success</Badge>
        <Badge color={m3Theme.colors.errorTerminal}>Error</Badge>
      </Box>

      <Spinner label="Loading..." />
    </Box>
  );
}

render(<App />);

Button Equivalent

import {Box, Text} from 'ink';

<Box paddingX={2} paddingY={0}>
  <Text backgroundColor="magenta" color="white" bold> Action </Text>
</Box>

Navigation (Select)

import {Select} from '@inkjs/ui';

<Select
  options={[
    {label: '🏠 Home', value: 'home'},
    {label: '🔍 Search', value: 'search'},
    {label: '⚙️ Settings', value: 'settings'},
  ]}
  onChange={value => {}}
/>

ThemeProvider for M3

import {ThemeProvider, extendTheme} from '@inkjs/ui';

const m3InkTheme = extendTheme({
  components: {
    TextInput: {
      styles: {
        focusColor: 'magenta', // M3 primary
      },
    },
    Select: {
      styles: {
        highlightColor: 'magenta',
      },
    },
    Spinner: {
      styles: {
        color: 'magenta',
      },
    },
  },
});

function App() {
  return (
    <ThemeProvider theme={m3InkTheme}>
      {/* All child components use M3-inspired theme */}
    </ThemeProvider>
  );
}

Terminal Color Considerations

• Modern terminals support 24-bit (true color) via hex values — use full M3 hex tokens
• For legacy terminals (256/16 color), map M3 roles to named ANSI colors:
  • Primary → magenta (closest to M3 purple primary)
  • Secondary → gray
  • Tertiary → cyan
  • Error → red
  • Success → green (custom role for CLI)
• Detect color support with chalk.level or supports-color package
• Always provide fallback named colors for maximum compatibility

M3 Component Mapping for CLI

M3 Component	Ink/ink-ui Equivalent	Notes
Filled Button	<Box> + <Text> styled	Background color + text
Text Field	<TextInput>	From @inkjs/ui
Select / Menu	<Select>	From @inkjs/ui
Multi-select	<MultiSelect>	From @inkjs/ui
Progress Indicator	<Spinner>, <ProgressBar>	From @inkjs/ui
Badge / Chip	<Badge>	From @inkjs/ui
Confirm Dialog	<ConfirmInput>	From @inkjs/ui
Card	<Box borderStyle="round">	Bordered container
Divider	<Text>{'─'.repeat(n)}</Text>	Horizontal rule
List	<UnorderedList>, <OrderedList>	From @inkjs/ui
Alert / Snackbar	<Alert>	From @inkjs/ui

Checklist

• M3 color tokens defined in a theme object
• Terminal color fallbacks provided for legacy terminals
• @inkjs/ui ThemeProvider configured with M3-inspired colors
• Components use theme tokens (not hard-coded colors)
• Dark terminal variant provided
• Color detection implemented (true color vs 256 vs 16)

Resources

• Ink: https://github.com/vadimdemedes/ink
• Ink UI components: https://github.com/vadimdemedes/ink-ui
• npm (ink): https://www.npmjs.com/package/ink
• npm (@inkjs/ui): https://www.npmjs.com/package/@inkjs/ui