Evergreen vs Material UI
Which should you use? A side-by-side look at what each one does, who it suits, what it costs, how hard it is to set up, and where each falls short.
Open source · MIT
A React UI component library for building web apps, maintained by Segment.
Open source · MIT
A React component library of ready-made UI pieces built on Google's Material Design.
The short answer
Choose Evergreen if you need…
- React developers building web applications who want prebuilt components
- Teams that want a consistent design language across an internal or enterprise web product
- Projects that need server-side rendering with Next.js or similar frameworks
- Developers who want to customize the look through theming
Choose Material UI if you need…
- React developers who want a consistent, prebuilt set of UI components
- Teams that want to follow Material Design guidelines
- Projects that need a large, documented component set
- Developers who want to extend basic components with more complex ones from the companion MUI X library
Side-by-side
| Evergreen | Material UI | |
|---|---|---|
| Type | Library | Library |
| Price | Free and open source | Free and open source |
| Licence | MIT | MIT |
| GitHub stars | 12.4k | 99.3k |
| Setup difficulty | Intermediate | Intermediate |
| How you get it | Install with a package manager | Install with a package manager |
| Main language | JavaScript | JavaScript |
| Last code update | 4 months ago | 4 days ago |
What each one is
Evergreen
Evergreen is a set of ready-made React user interface components, such as buttons, that developers can drop into web applications. It is built on a styling base called ui-box and includes a theming layer and server-side rendering support. Teams use it to build consistent web product interfaces without designing every component from scratch.
Material UI
Material UI is a collection of React components, such as buttons, menus and form controls, that follow Google's Material Design visual system. Developers add these pieces to a React web app instead of building every interface element from scratch. The README describes it as a mature project with thousands of contributors and an MIT license.
Best for
Evergreen
- React developers building web applications who want prebuilt components
- Teams that want a consistent design language across an internal or enterprise web product
- Projects that need server-side rendering with Next.js or similar frameworks
- Developers who want to customize the look through theming
Material UI
- React developers who want a consistent, prebuilt set of UI components
- Teams that want to follow Material Design guidelines
- Projects that need a large, documented component set
- Developers who want to extend basic components with more complex ones from the companion MUI X library
Strengths
Evergreen
- Components work out of the box with sensible defaults
- Built on a composable primitive, so components can be extended
- Includes documentation, theming docs, and a Next.js example
Material UI
- Large, well-documented component set based on a known design system
- Long development history and a large contributor base, according to the README
- Free under the MIT license
Not ideal for
Evergreen
- People who are not writing React code, since the components are React-specific
- Projects needing a framework other than React, such as Vue or Angular
- Teams looking for a long-term stable API without checking the v7 migration guide first, since the README points to a major version migration
Material UI
- People who are not writing React code, since the library is built for React specifically
- Teams that want a completely custom visual style without Material Design, because the components follow that look by default
- Beginners with no JavaScript or React background, who should learn the basics first
Trade-offs
Evergreen
- The README shows the older ReactDOM.render example, so check current docs for your React version
- Requires moving through a v7 migration guide if upgrading from earlier versions
- Last-known README copyright is 2021, so verify the project's current status before adopting
Material UI
- Tied to React, so it does not help with other frameworks
- Its default look is recognizably Material Design, which takes extra work to restyle
- Advanced components are in a separate project, MUI X, which may need its own setup
Getting started
Evergreen
Install with yarn
yarn add evergreen-uiInstall with npm
npm install --save evergreen-uiMaterial UI
Install the package from npm (command not shown in the README excerpt; this is the standard npm form)
npm install @mui/material @emotion/react @emotion/styledFrequently asked questions
What is the difference between Evergreen and Material UI?
Evergreen: A React UI component library for building web apps, maintained by Segment. Material UI: A React component library of ready-made UI pieces built on Google's Material Design. Evergreen suits react developers building web applications who want prebuilt components, while Material UI suits react developers who want a consistent, prebuilt set of ui components.
Are Evergreen and Material UI free?
Evergreen: Free and open source. Material UI: Free and open source.
Is Evergreen or Material UI more popular?
Material UI has more GitHub stars (99.3k) than Evergreen (12.4k). Popularity isn't the same as fit — check which one matches your use case above.
What are other alternatives to Evergreen and Material UI?
Other options people compare them with include Chakra UI, Ant Design, Radix Primitives, Primer CSS, React Native Elements.
Keep comparing
Built from our catalogue entries for both products: open-source details come from each project's README (AI-assisted, refreshed weekly) and GitHub data; AI-tool details are editorial. Spotted something wrong? Let us know from either product's page.