shadcn/ui vs Mantine: which to use?

What each one is

shadcn/ui copies component source into your project with a CLI, so you own and edit every file. It ships a deliberately focused core of accessible components, charts and blocks for Tailwind CSS v4, a registry format that other sites publish into, and a choice of Radix UI or Base UI underneath.

Mantine is a fully featured React library maintained by Vitaly Rtishchev and hundreds of contributors. The core covers inputs, overlays, navigation, layout and data display, and separate packages add a form library, date pickers, charts built on Recharts, notifications, a spotlight command center and a rich text editor based on Tiptap. Styles ship as regular CSS files, and customization goes through CSS modules, the Styles API or style props.

Where shadcn/ui shines

• You own the code. Every component is a file in your repo, so a change is an edit rather than an override.
• Tailwind native. Components use Tailwind CSS v4 utilities and CSS variable tokens, the same as the rest of a Tailwind codebase.
• The registry. One CLI installs from the official registry and from community registries, and an official MCP server helps AI tools browse them.
• A small core. The set is deliberately focused, which keeps the codebase lean and easy to reason about.

Where Mantine shines

• Breadth in one family. Components, 70+ hooks, forms, dates and charts come from one maintainer with one API style.
• Forms and dates. The form package handles state and validation, and the dates package provides date and time pickers, both designed to work with the core inputs.
• No Tailwind required. Teams that prefer CSS modules or plain CSS get a complete system without utility classes.
• Stable releases. A documented cadence of patch, minor and major versions, with docs for previous versions kept online.
• Free extras. Mantine UI offers 123 free prebuilt components, and @mantine/hooks works on its own.

The trade-offs

• Ownership or breadth. shadcn/ui keeps its core small and puts every line in your repo. Mantine gives you far more out of the box, maintained upstream, and you customize it through its styling APIs.
• Updates. Mantine releases arrive through npm on a documented cadence. shadcn/ui components live in your repo, so you apply upstream changes yourself.
• Forms and dates. Mantine has dedicated packages for both, designed to work with its inputs.
• Mixing them. One app with both means two styling systems. Mantine's help center says disabling Tailwind's preflight is usually enough to keep global styles from affecting Mantine components, so plan the split before mixing them on one page.

Where MiniDev UI fits

MiniDev UI sits on the shadcn/ui side: a free, MIT shadcn-compatible registry on Base UI and Tailwind CSS v4 that installs with the same CLI. It is a way to get closer to Mantine's breadth without leaving Tailwind, with over 500 items including data tables, billing and settings pages, command palettes, notification centers and AI chat.

It does not include a separate form state library like @mantine/form; it provides the input components and a form wizard. Compare it with shadcn/ui and with Mantine.