Best Practices

  • Clear Triggers: Always use clear, descriptive labels for collapse triggers that indicate the action and content.

  • Progressive Disclosure: Use collapse to hide secondary content or advanced options that aren't immediately needed.

  • Performance: For large content, consider using unmountOnExit to improve performance by unmounting content when collapsed.

  • Animation Timing: Adjust the timeout prop to match your application's animation speed for a cohesive feel.

  • Consistent Behavior: Maintain consistent behavior across your application - don't mix different animation patterns for similar interactions.

Accessibility Considerations

  • Keyboard Navigation: Ensure the collapse trigger is keyboard accessible and can be activated with both Enter and Space keys.

  • ARIA Attributes: The component automatically handles aria-expanded and aria-controls attributes.

  • Focus Management: Consider managing focus when content is expanded/collapsed, especially for screen reader users.

  • Screen Reader Announcements: Use aria-live regions to announce state changes to screen reader users.

When to Use
  • FAQs and help sections
  • Forms with optional or advanced fields
  • Content that can be toggled on/off
  • Accordion interfaces
  • Mobile navigation menus

When to Consider Something Else
  • For simple show/hide without animation, consider conditional rendering
  • For modal dialogs or overlays, use the Dialog component instead
  • For tabbed interfaces, consider using the Tabs component

Performance Optimization
  • Use unmountOnExit for better performance with large content
  • Consider code-splitting for complex content within collapsible sections
  • Memoize the content if it includes expensive computations

Common Patterns
  • Accordion: Multiple collapsible sections where only one can be open at a time
  • Expandable Cards: Cards with a summary that can be expanded for more details
  • Progressive Disclosure: Show advanced options or additional information on demand
  • Mobile Navigation: Collapsible menus for mobile views