Column Sizing Guide

Want to skip to the implementation? Check out these examples:

• column-sizing
• column-resizing-performant

Column Sizing API

The column sizing feature allows you to optionally specify the width of each column including min and max widths. It also allows you and your users the ability to dynamically change the width of all columns at will, eg. by dragging the column headers.

Columns by default are given the following measurement options:

export const defaultColumnSizing = {
  size: 150,
  minSize: 20,
  maxSize: Number.MAX_SAFE_INTEGER,
}

export const defaultColumnSizing = {
  size: 150,
  minSize: 20,
  maxSize: Number.MAX_SAFE_INTEGER,
}

These defaults can be overridden by both tableOptions.defaultColumn and individual column defs, in that order.

const columns = [
  {
    accessorKey: 'col1',
    size: 270, //set column size for this column
  },
  //...
]

const table = useReactTable({
  //override default column sizing
  defaultColumn: {
    size: 200, //starting column size
    minSize: 50, //enforced during column resizing
    maxSize: 500, //enforced during column resizing
  },
})

const columns = [
  {
    accessorKey: 'col1',
    size: 270, //set column size for this column
  },
  //...
]

const table = useReactTable({
  //override default column sizing
  defaultColumn: {
    size: 200, //starting column size
    minSize: 50, //enforced during column resizing
    maxSize: 500, //enforced during column resizing
  },
})

The column "sizes" are stored in the table state as numbers, and are usually interpreted as pixel unit values, but you can hook up these column sizing values to your css styles however you see fit.

As a headless utility, table logic for column sizing is really only a collection of states that you can apply to your own layouts how you see fit (our example above implements 2 styles of this logic). You can apply these width measurements in a variety of ways:

• semantic table elements or any elements being displayed in a table css mode
• div/span elements or any elements being displayed in a non-table css mode
  • Block level elements with strict widths
  • Absolutely positioned elements with strict widths
  • Flexbox positioned elements with loose widths
  • Grid positioned elements with loose widths
• Really any layout mechanism that can interpolate cell widths into a table structure.

Each of these approaches has its own tradeoffs and limitations which are usually opinions held by a UI/component library or design system, luckily not you 😉.

TanStack Table provides built-in column resizing state and APIs that allow you to easily implement column resizing in your table UI with a variety of options for UX and performance.

By default, the column.getCanResize() API will return true by default for all columns, but you can either disable column resizing for all columns with the enableColumnResizing table option, or disable column resizing on a per-column basis with the enableResizing column option.

const columns = [
  {
    accessorKey: 'id',
    enableResizing: false, //disable resizing for just this column
    size: 200, //starting column size
  },
  //...
]

const columns = [
  {
    accessorKey: 'id',
    enableResizing: false, //disable resizing for just this column
    size: 200, //starting column size
  },
  //...
]

By default, the column resize mode is set to "onEnd". This means that the column.getSize() API will not return the new column size until the user has finished resizing (dragging) the column. Usually a small UI indicator will be displayed while the user is resizing the column.

In React TanStack Table adapter, where achieving 60 fps column resizing renders can be difficult, depending on the complexity of your table or web page, the "onEnd" column resize mode can be a good default option to avoid stuttering or lagging while the user resizes columns. That is not to say that you cannot achieve 60 fps column resizing renders while using TanStack React Table, but you may have to do some extra memoization or other performance optimizations in order to achieve this.

Advanced column resizing performance tips will be discussed down below.

If you want to change the column resize mode to "onChange" for immediate column resizing renders, you can do so with the columnResizeMode table option.

const table = useReactTable({
  //...
  columnResizeMode: 'onChange', //change column resize mode to "onChange"
})

const table = useReactTable({
  //...
  columnResizeMode: 'onChange', //change column resize mode to "onChange"
})

By default, TanStack Table assumes that the table markup is laid out in a left-to-right direction. For right-to-left layouts, you may need to change the column resize direction to "rtl".

const table = useReactTable({
  //...
  columnResizeDirection: 'rtl', //change column resize direction to "rtl" for certain locales
})

const table = useReactTable({
  //...
  columnResizeDirection: 'rtl', //change column resize direction to "rtl" for certain locales
})

There are a few really handy APIs that you can use to hook up your column resizing drag interactions to your UI.

To apply the size of a column to the column head cells, data cells, or footer cells, you can use the following APIs:

header.getSize()
column.getSize()
cell.column.getSize()

header.getSize()
column.getSize()
cell.column.getSize()

How you apply these size styles to your markup is up to you, but it is pretty common to use either CSS variables or inline styles to apply the column sizes.

<th
  key={header.id}
  colSpan={header.colSpan}
  style={{ width: `${header.getSize()}px` }}
>

<th
  key={header.id}
  colSpan={header.colSpan}
  style={{ width: `${header.getSize()}px` }}
>

Though, as discussed in the advanced column resizing performance section, you may want to consider using CSS variables to apply column sizes to your markup.

TanStack Table provides a pre-built event handler to make your drag interactions easy to implement. These event handlers are just convenience functions that call other internal APIs to update the column sizing state and re-render the table. Use header.getResizeHandler() to connect to your column resize drag interactions, for both mouse and touch events.

<ColumnResizeHandle
  onMouseDown={header.getResizeHandler()} //for desktop
  onTouchStart={header.getResizeHandler()} //for mobile
/>

<ColumnResizeHandle
  onMouseDown={header.getResizeHandler()} //for desktop
  onTouchStart={header.getResizeHandler()} //for mobile
/>

TanStack Table keeps track of an state object called columnSizingInfo that you can use to render a column resize indicator UI.

<ColumnResizeIndicator
  style={{
    transform: header.column.getIsResizing()
      ? `translateX(${table.getState().columnSizingInfo.deltaOffset}px)`
      : '',
  }}
/>

<ColumnResizeIndicator
  style={{
    transform: header.column.getIsResizing()
      ? `translateX(${table.getState().columnSizingInfo.deltaOffset}px)`
      : '',
  }}
/>

If you are creating large or complex tables (and using React 😉), you may find that if you do not add proper memoization to your render logic, your users may experience degraded performance while resizing columns.

We have created a performant column resizing example that demonstrates how to achieve 60 fps column resizing renders with a complex table that may otherwise have slow renders. It is recommended that you just look at that example to see how it is done, but these are the basic things to keep in mind:

1. Don't use column.getSize() on every header and every data cell. Instead, calculate all column widths once upfront, memoized!
2. Memoize your Table Body while resizing is in progress.
3. Use CSS variables to communicate column widths to your table cells.

If you follow these steps, you should see significant performance improvements while resizing columns.

If you are not using React, and are using the Svelte, Vue, or Solid adapters instead, you may not need to worry about this as much, but similar principles apply.