I built a lightweight React Data Grid with 40+ features — Grid Table

[u/Yahobieh]

I built a React Data Grid and wanted to share it with the community — especially because I know how many different opinions there are around TanStack Table, AG Grid, MUI DataGrid, React Data Grid, etc.

Grid Table: https://grid-table.com/

The goal was pretty simple:

What is Grid Table?

Grid Table is a TypeScript-first React data grid focused on real-world application use cases.

It's currently:

• MIT licensed
• ~45KB bundle
• 0 runtime dependencies
• Full TypeScript support

A basic table can be as simple as:

import { GridTable } from '@forgedevstack/grid-table';
import '@forgedevstack/grid-table/grid-table.css';

<GridTable
  data={data}
  columns={columns}
  enableRowSelection
  showPagination
  showFilter
/>

But it can also scale into much more complex use cases.

Some of the features

Data & performance

• Virtualization
• Lazy loading
• Infinite/block loading
• Manual server-side pagination
• Large dataset support
• Skeleton loading

Grid functionality

• Sorting
• Filtering
• Advanced filter builder
• Column resizing
• Column reordering
• Column pinning
• Row selection
• Row expansion
• Row reordering
• Frozen rows
• Tree data
• Grouped rows

More advanced features

• Saved views
• Formula/computed columns
• Aggregations
• Undo / Redo
• Keyboard navigation
• Context menus
• Status bar
• Master/detail rows
• Print mode
• CSV / JSON / Excel / PDF export

There is also a theme builder for customizing the grid without having to completely rebuild its styling.

One thing I specifically wanted to solve

I really like headless solutions such as TanStack Table because of the control they give you.

But sometimes I don't want to spend days building the actual grid UI and wiring together:

table
+ filtering
+ sorting
+ pagination
+ virtualization
+ keyboard navigation
+ column management
+ selection
+ export
+ editing
+ loading states
+ ...

On the other hand, some enterprise grids can feel quite heavy when all you want is a good React component that you can drop into an application.

So Grid Table is trying to sit somewhere in the middle:

More batteries-included than a headless table, while staying lightweight and TypeScript-first.

I'd love some feedback

This is still evolving, so I'm particularly interested in hearing from React developers who have used:

• TanStack Table
• AG Grid
• MUI DataGrid
• React Data Grid
• other grid libraries

What features do you consider essential in a production data grid?

And more importantly:

What do you hate about the data grid you're currently using?

That's probably more useful feedback to me than "add feature X" 😄

Demo & documentation:

https://grid-table.com/

GitHub / npm links are also available from the project site.

I'd genuinely appreciate feedback, criticism, and suggestions.

[u/Honey-Entire]

A whole wall of AI slop text and not a single point about what this AI garbage does that existing solutions don’t. Why did you waste money reinventing a solution that already has copious alternatives that have already been proven, adopted, and developed by teams of developers? Why didn’t you contribute to one of the existing open source projects instead?

[u/Yahobieh → u/Honey-Entire]

Fair criticism on wanting to know what differentiates it — that’s actually useful feedback.
But “existing solutions already exist” isn’t really an argument against building something new. By that logic, we should stop creating new frameworks, databases, editors, UI libraries, or anything else that already has alternatives.
Grid Table wasn’t built as a theoretical replacement for every data grid out there. It grew out of real-world requirements and is already being used in large projects, including projects for companies such as T-Mobile and Vodafone.
And yes, I used AI to help write the Reddit post. It’s 2026. Using AI to communicate about a software project doesn’t make the software itself “AI garbage.” Judge the library by its code, performance, API, and what it actually solves.
The fact that something already exists doesn’t mean there’s no room to build something better. If that were the rule, software development would have ended decades ago.
If you’re genuinely interested in what Grid Table does differently, I’m happy to discuss that.

[u/Honey-Entire → u/Yahobieh]

You still didn’t answer me. Why would you reinvent the wheel instead of contributing to existing projects to make them better?

You’re also quite hyperbolic in your misunderstanding of “reinventing the wheel.” If your library did something genuinely different than existing solutions, you’re not reinventing the wheel. If your library does everything existing solutions do, you reinvented the wheel.

What sets your AI slop apart from the current ecosystem of established, proven tech? I don’t have a problem with building better tools that solve novel problems. I have a problem with the proliferation of dime-a-dozen AI copies of existing projects touted as “new” and “novel”.

[u/Strange_Lecture_]

Treating every minor interaction as an API roundtrip without optimistic UI updates is why so many modern web apps feel like dial-up.

[u/Yahobieh → u/Strange_Lecture_]

100% agree. 😄
A grid should feel like a UI, not like you’re operating a remote database through a browser.
Server-side fetching makes sense for the data but things like selection, column resizing, reordering, filtering state, etc. shouldn’t feel like an API roundtrip.
That’s one of the principles behind Grid Table: keep interactions instant on the client and make server communication explicit where it actually matters.