useHooks(🐠)

This hook handles all the stateful logic required to add a ☾ dark mode toggle to your website. It utilizes localStorage to remember the user's chosen mode, defaults to their browser or OS level setting using the prefers-color-scheme media query and manages the setting of a .dark-mode className on body to apply your styles.

This post also helps illustrate the power of hook composition. The syncing of state to localStorage is handled by our useLocalStorage hook. Detecting the user's dark mode preference is handled by our useMedia hook. Both of these hooks were created for other use-cases, but here we've composed them to create a super useful hook in relatively few lines of code. It's almost as if hooks bring the compositional power of React components to stateful logic! 🤯

// Usage
function App() {
  const [darkMode, setDarkMode] = useDarkMode();

  return (
    <div>
      <div className="navbar">
        <Toggle darkMode={darkMode} setDarkMode={setDarkMode} />
      </div>
      <Content />
    </div>
  );
}

// Hook
function useDarkMode() {
  // Use our useLocalStorage hook to persist state through a page refresh.
  // Read the recipe for this hook to learn more: usehooks.com/useLocalStorage
  const [enabledState, setEnabledState] = useLocalStorage("dark-mode-enabled");

  // See if user has set a browser or OS preference for dark mode.
  // The usePrefersDarkMode hook composes a useMedia hook (see code below).
  const prefersDarkMode = usePrefersDarkMode();

  // If enabledState is defined use it, otherwise fallback to prefersDarkMode.
  // This allows user to override OS level setting on our website.
  const enabled =
    typeof enabledState !== "undefined" ? enabledState : prefersDarkMode;

  // Fire off effect that add/removes dark mode class
  useEffect(
    () => {
      const className = "dark-mode";
      const element = window.document.body;
      if (enabled) {
        element.classList.add(className);
      } else {
        element.classList.remove(className);
      }
    },
    [enabled] // Only re-call effect when value changes
  );

  // Return enabled state and setter
  return [enabled, setEnabledState];
}

// Compose our useMedia hook to detect dark mode preference.
// The API for useMedia looks a bit weird, but that's because ...
// ... it was designed to support multiple media queries and return values.
// Thanks to hook composition we can hide away that extra complexity!
// Read the recipe for useMedia to learn more: usehooks.com/useMedia
function usePrefersDarkMode() {
  return useMedia(["(prefers-color-scheme: dark)"], [true], false);
}

// Usage
function App() {
  const [darkMode, setDarkMode] = useDarkMode();

  return (
    <div>
      <div className="navbar">
        <Toggle darkMode={darkMode} setDarkMode={setDarkMode} />
      </div>
      <Content />
    </div>
  );
}

// Hook
function useDarkMode() {
  // Use our useLocalStorage hook to persist state through a page refresh.
  // Read the recipe for this hook to learn more: usehooks.com/useLocalStorage
  const [enabledState, setEnabledState] = useLocalStorage<boolean>(
    "dark-mode-enabled",
    false
  );

  // See if user has set a browser or OS preference for dark mode.
  // The usePrefersDarkMode hook composes a useMedia hook (see code below).
  const prefersDarkMode = usePrefersDarkMode();

  // If enabledState is defined use it, otherwise fallback to prefersDarkMode.
  // This allows user to override OS level setting on our website.
  const enabled = enabledState ?? prefersDarkMode;

  // Fire off effect that add/removes dark mode class
  useEffect(
    () => {
      const className = "dark-mode";
      const element = window.document.body;
      if (enabled) {
        element.classList.add(className);
      } else {
        element.classList.remove(className);
      }
    },
    [enabled] // Only re-call effect when value changes
  );

  // Return enabled state and setter
  return [enabled, setEnabledState];
}

// Compose our useMedia hook to detect dark mode preference.
// The API for useMedia looks a bit weird, but that's because ...
// ... it was designed to support multiple media queries and return values.
// Thanks to hook composition we can hide away that extra complexity!
// Read the recipe for useMedia to learn more: usehooks.com/useMedia
function usePrefersDarkMode() {
  return useMedia<boolean>(["(prefers-color-scheme: dark)"], [true], false);
}