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React Hook Form

React Hook Form

Building forms with React Hook Form and Zod.

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Forms are tricky. They are one of the most common things you'll build in a web application, but also one of the most complex.

Well-designed HTML forms are:

  • Well-structured and semantically correct.
  • Easy to use and navigate (keyboard).
  • Accessible with ARIA attributes and proper labels.
  • Has support for client and server side validation.
  • Well-styled and consistent with the rest of the application.

In this guide, we will take a look at building forms with react-hook-form and zod. We're going to use a <FormField> component to compose accessible forms using Radix UI components.

Features

The <Form /> component is a wrapper around the react-hook-form library. It provides a few things:

  • Composable components for building forms.
  • A <FormField /> component for building controlled form fields.
  • Form validation using zod.
  • Handles accessibility and error messages.
  • Uses React.useId() for generating unique IDs.
  • Applies the correct aria attributes to form fields based on states.
  • Built to work with all Radix UI components.
  • Bring your own schema library. We use zod but you can use anything you want.
  • You have full control over the markup and styling.

Anatomy

<Form>
  <FormField
    control={...}
    name="..."
    render={() => (
      <FormItem>
        <FormLabel />
        <FormControl>
          { /* Your form field */}
        </FormControl>
        <FormDescription />
        <FormMessage />
      </FormItem>
    )}
  />
</Form>

Example

const form = useForm()
 
<FormField
  control={form.control}
  name="username"
  render={({ field }) => (
    <FormItem>
      <FormLabel>Username</FormLabel>
      <FormControl>
        <Input placeholder="shadcn" {...field} />
      </FormControl>
      <FormDescription>This is your public display name.</FormDescription>
      <FormMessage />
    </FormItem>
  )}
/>

Installation

Command

npx shadcn-ui@latest add form

Usage

Create a form schema

Define the shape of your form using a Zod schema. You can read more about using Zod in the Zod documentation.

"use client"
 
import { z } from "zod"
 
const formSchema = z.object({
  username: z.string().min(2).max(50),
})

Define a form

Use the useForm hook from react-hook-form to create a form.

"use client"
 
import { zodResolver } from "@hookform/resolvers/zod"
import { useForm } from "react-hook-form"
import { z } from "zod"
 
const formSchema = z.object({
  username: z.string().min(2, {
    message: "Username must be at least 2 characters.",
  }),
})
 
export function ProfileForm() {
  // 1. Define your form.
  const form = useForm<z.infer<typeof formSchema>>({
    resolver: zodResolver(formSchema),
    defaultValues: {
      username: "",
    },
  })
 
  // 2. Define a submit handler.
  function onSubmit(values: z.infer<typeof formSchema>) {
    // Do something with the form values.
    // ✅ This will be type-safe and validated.
    console.log(values)
  }
}

Since FormField is using a controlled component, you need to provide a default value for the field. See the React Hook Form docs to learn more about controlled components.

Build your form

We can now use the <Form /> components to build our form.

"use client"
 
import { zodResolver } from "@hookform/resolvers/zod"
import { useForm } from "react-hook-form"
import { z } from "zod"
 
import { Button } from "@/components/ui/button"
import {
  Form,
  FormControl,
  FormDescription,
  FormField,
  FormItem,
  FormLabel,
  FormMessage,
} from "@/components/ui/form"
import { Input } from "@/components/ui/input"
 
const formSchema = z.object({
  username: z.string().min(2, {
    message: "Username must be at least 2 characters.",
  }),
})
 
export function ProfileForm() {
  // ...
 
  return (
    <Form {...form}>
      <form onSubmit={form.handleSubmit(onSubmit)} className="space-y-8">
        <FormField
          control={form.control}
          name="username"
          render={({ field }) => (
            <FormItem>
              <FormLabel>Username</FormLabel>
              <FormControl>
                <Input placeholder="shadcn" {...field} />
              </FormControl>
              <FormDescription>
                This is your public display name.
              </FormDescription>
              <FormMessage />
            </FormItem>
          )}
        />
        <Button type="submit">Submit</Button>
      </form>
    </Form>
  )
}

Done

That's it. You now have a fully accessible form that is type-safe with client-side validation.

This is your public display name.

Examples

See the following links for more examples on how to use the <Form /> component with other components:

Dropdown MenuHover Card