How to Dynamically Show a Vue Component

When developing with Vue, you often need to display components based on the application state. While you can manually place components at the beginning, this approach becomes less flexible as your application grows. In this blog post, we will explore two different methods to dynamically show components in Vue.

Using conditional directives

One of the simplest options is to use the v-if and v-else directives. These directives allow you to conditionally render components based on a given condition. Here’s an example:

<template>
  <main>
    <AddFirstTodo v-if="noTodos" />
    <div v-else>
      <AddTodo />
      <Todos :todos="todos" />
    </div>
  </main>
</template>

<script>
export default {
  data() {
    return {
      todos: [],
    };
  },
  computed: {
    noTodos() {
      return this.todos.length === 0;
    },
  },
};
</script>

In this example, the v-if directive checks the noTodos computed property, which returns false if the todos state property contains at least one item. This way, you can conditionally show either the AddFirstTodo component or the AddTodo and Todos components.

You can also nest conditionals within one another. Here’s an example:

<template>
  <main>
    <Component1 v-if="shouldShowComponent1" />
    <div v-else>
      <Component2 v-if="shouldShowComponent2" />
      <div v-else>
        <Component3 />
      </div>
    </div>
  </main>
</template>

In this case, the components will be shown based on the values of the shouldShowComponent1 and shouldShowComponent2 properties.

Using the component component and is

Another approach to dynamically showing components is by using the component component along with the v-bind:is directive. This allows you to assign a component dynamically to a placeholder. Here’s an example:

<component v-bind:is="componentName"></component>

In this example, the componentName property holds the name of the component we want to render. It can be a part of the application state or a computed property. Here’s how you would set it up:

<script>
export default {
  data() {
    return {
      componentName: 'aComponent',
    };
  },
};
</script>

With this setup, the component will dynamically render the component specified by the componentName property.

By using these approaches, you can have more flexibility in showing or hiding components based on the application’s state. Remember to consider the specific needs of your application in order to choose the most suitable method.

Using conditional directives#

Using conditional directives