I can't figure out how to set default property values for my components using Typescript.
This is the source code:
class PageState
{
}
export class PageProps
{
foo: string = "bar";
}
export class PageComponent extends React.Component<PageProps, PageState>
{
public render(): JSX.Element
{
return (
<span>Hello, world</span>
);
}
}
And when I try to use the component like this:
ReactDOM.render(<PageComponent />, document.getElementById("page"));
I get an error saying property foo
is missing. I want to use the default value. I've also tried to use static defaultProps = ...
inside the component, but it had no effect as I suspected.
src/typescript/main.tsx(8,17): error TS2324: Property 'foo' is missing in type 'IntrinsicAttributes & IntrinsicClassAttributes<PageComponent> & PageProps & { children?: ReactEle...'.
How can I use default property values? Many JS components my company uses rely on them and not using them is not a choice.
Default props with class component
Using static defaultProps
is correct. You should also be using interfaces, not classes, for the props and state.
Update 2018/12/1: TypeScript has improved the type-checking related to defaultProps
over time. Read on for latest and greatest usage down to older usages and issues.
For TypeScript 3.0 and up
TypeScript specifically added support for defaultProps
to make type-checking work how you'd expect. Example:
interface PageProps {
foo: string;
bar: string;
}
export class PageComponent extends React.Component<PageProps, {}> {
public static defaultProps = {
foo: "default"
};
public render(): JSX.Element {
return (
<span>Hello, { this.props.foo.toUpperCase() }</span>
);
}
}
Which can be rendered and compile without passing a foo
attribute:
<PageComponent bar={ "hello" } />
Note that:
foo
is not marked optional (ie foo?: string
) even though it's not required as a JSX attribute. Marking as optional would mean that it could be undefined
, but in fact it never will be undefined
because defaultProps
provides a default value. Think of it similar to how you can mark a function parameter optional, or with a default value, but not both, yet both mean the call doesn't need to specify a value. TypeScript 3.0+ treats defaultProps
in a similar way, which is really cool for React users!
- The
defaultProps
has no explicit type annotation. It's type is inferred and used by the compiler to determine which JSX attributes are required. You could use defaultProps: Pick<PageProps, "foo">
to ensure defaultProps
matches a sub-set of PageProps
. More on this caveat is explained here.
- This requires
@types/react
version 16.4.11
to work properly.
For TypeScript 2.1 until 3.0
Before TypeScript 3.0 implemented support for defaultProps
you could still make use of it, and it worked 100% with React, but you'd have to mark props that have defaults as optional with ?
. Example:
interface PageProps {
foo?: string;
bar: number;
}
export class PageComponent extends React.Component<PageProps, {}> {
public static defaultProps: Partial<PageProps> = {
foo: "default"
};
public render(): JSX.Element {
return (
<span>Hello, world</span>
);
}
}
Note that:
- It's a good idea to annotate
defaultProps
with Partial<>
so that it type-checks against your props, but you don't have to supply every required property with a default value, which makes no sense since required properties should never need a default.
- When using
strictNullChecks
the value of this.props.foo
will be possibly undefined
and require a non-null assertion (ie this.props.foo!
) or type-guard (ie if (this.props.foo) ...
) to remove undefined
. This is annoying since the default prop value means it actually will never be undefined, but TS didn't understand this flow. That's one of the main reasons TS 3.0 added explicit support for defaultProps
.
Before TypeScript 2.1
This works the same but you don't have Partial
types, so just omit Partial<>
and either supply default values for all required props (even though those defaults will never be used) or omit the explicit type annotation completely.
Default props with Stateless Functional Components
You can use defaultProps
on function components as well, but you have to type your function to the StatelessComponent
interface so that TypeScript knows about defaultProps
on the function:
interface PageProps {
foo?: string;
bar: number;
}
const PageComponent: StatelessComponent<PageProps> = (props) => {
return (
<span>Hello, {props.foo}, {props.bar}</span>
);
};
PageComponent.defaultProps = {
foo: "default"
};
Note that you don't have to use Partial<PageProps>
anywhere because StatelessComponent.defaultProps
is already specified as a partial in TS 2.1+.
Another nice alternative (this is what I use) is to destructure your props
parameters and assign default values directly:
const PageComponent: StatelessComponent<PageProps> = ({foo = "default", bar}) => {
return (
<span>Hello, {foo}, {bar}</span>
);
};
Then you don't need the defaultProps
at all! Be aware that if you do provide defaultProps
on a function component it will take precedence over default parameter values, because React will always explicitly pass the defaultProps
values (so the parameters are never undefined, thus the default parameter is never used.) So you'd use one or the other, not both.
With Typescript 2.1+, use Partial < T > instead of making your interface properties optional.
export interface Props {
obj: Model,
a: boolean
b: boolean
}
public static defaultProps: Partial<Props> = {
a: true
};
With Typescript 3.0 there is a new solution to this issue:
export interface Props {
name: string;
}
export class Greet extends React.Component<Props> {
render() {
const { name } = this.props;
return <div>Hello ${name.toUpperCase()}!</div>;
}
static defaultProps = { name: "world"};
}
// Type-checks! No type assertions needed!
let el = <Greet />
Note that for this to work you need a newer version of @types/react
than 16.4.6
. It works with 16.4.11
.
From a comment by @pamelus on the accepted answer:
You either have to make all interface properties optional (bad) or
specify default value also for all required fields (unnecessary
boilerplate) or avoid specifying type on defaultProps.
Actually you can use Typescript's interface inheritance. The resulting code is only a little bit more verbose.
interface OptionalGoogleAdsProps {
format?: string;
className?: string;
style?: any;
scriptSrc?: string
}
interface GoogleAdsProps extends OptionalGoogleAdsProps {
client: string;
slot: string;
}
/**
* Inspired by https://github.com/wonism/react-google-ads/blob/master/src/google-ads.js
*/
export default class GoogleAds extends React.Component<GoogleAdsProps, void> {
public static defaultProps: OptionalGoogleAdsProps = {
format: "auto",
style: { display: 'block' },
scriptSrc: "//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js"
};