Listing of JavaScript Editable Table Libraries

A data table is one of the core parts of any modern data-driven web application. This UI element, also known as a data grid, offers a way to clearly present big data in a series of rows and columns. Such tables are especially valuable if they allow end-users to interact with data and introduce editing changes on the fly.

How to implement such a useful thing in your project? The first option is to write your own code. By doing that, you build a unique grid that fully complies with your requirements without extra adjustments. But such an approach will most likely require much time and effort. Therefore, it can be more reasonable to purchase a ready-made grid component, enabling you to speed up the whole development process and add a lot of helpful features.

I’ve prepared a list of commercial JavaScript editable table libraries and UI widgets that can be incorporated into applications. It has become a common practice to use JavaScript frameworks in coding undertakings, that is why these libraries offer framework integrations or even separate React, Vue.js, Angular components (Syncfusion, ExtJS, Ignite UI). It is also important to note that some of the grids included in this article are distributed as separate grid solutions, while others are shipped in a package with other UI components.

Without further ado, let us proceed with the review of these products and their key functionalities.

Ag-Grid

Ag-Grid is a JavaScript library designed for reducing the implementation time of grid functionality in enterprise applications. Using this tool, you can enable not only typical interaction features for rows and columns but also more powerful capabilities such as pivoting, aggregations, live updates, and charts. You can also make it really easy for users to access functions for manipulating grid columns and filters by adding tool panels. 

Presenting data in a tree-like structure is also available as an option.  When talking about editing, you can configure in-cell or popup editors as well as a very useful undo/redo feature. This library relies on DOM virtualization to provide improved scrolling performance with large data sets. The overall look and feel of your grid is specified with customizable themes, while particular styling changes are implemented via CSS classes. There are two exporting options - Excel and CSV. If your app is targeted at users from different countries, the multi-language support (including languages with RTL text direction) will come in handy.

Resources: documentation, sample

Evaluation version: Ag-Grid

Bryntum Grid

Bryntum Grid is an independent JS grid component with a responsive design based on the ECMAScript 2020. Core features of this component such as sorting, inline editing, column resize, context menus work out of the box. If you want to offer users more useful functions like a tree view, searching, filtering, striped rows, summaries, you will have to enable them manually. The appearance of your grid is modified via five customizable themes and renderers.

The Bryntum development team paid special attention to the ability of the grid component to provide good performance with a large number of records. It was achieved thanks to the combination of various techniques: minimal DOM interactions, virtual rendering, and CSS optimizations. One more good thing about this component is that it supports custom data formats. The availability of several exporting options (PDF, PNG, Excel) can also be a great addition for end-users.

Resources: documentation, samples

Evaluation version: Bryntum Grid

DevExtreme Data Grid

DevExtreme DataGrid is a client-side grid widget implemented as a jQuery component. It enables you to shape data in a tabular form and provides users with an array of possibilities to select, group, sort, filter, and edit it. Editing modes can include client-side validation, collaborative editing option, cascading lookups, etc. to make the work with the grid more transparent. It is possible to show expandable detail sections under data rows by configuring master-detail interfaces. The grid structure can also include a customizable toolbar for showing predefined and custom commands. Templates for rows, columns, and cells (including 3-rd party templates) will help you to display the necessary types of data the way you need.

The widget was designed with mobile support in mind, therefore it automatically adapts its layout to screens with different resolutions and allows navigating with touch gestures. Thanks to the built-in server-side support for the main operations on rows and columns, you can feel comfortable about using this widget with large datasets. Moreover, you can also improve scrolling performance in many ways: virtual scrolling (local, remote, horizontal), infinite scrolling, record paging. DevExtreme Grid comes with a set of predefined themes that can be altered with the ThemeBuilder tool. 

Resources: documentation, samples

Evaluation version: DevExtreme

DHTMLX Grid

DHTMLX Grid is a developer-friendly JavaScript grid library with enhanced configuration and customization capabilities. It allows you to create data tables and complement them with a powerful set of features for viewing and manipulating data. For instance, you will be able to filter and sort data according to different criteria, freeze columns, reorder rows and columns by drag and drop, select multiple grid cells, navigate the table with a keyboard, apply various number formats, and much more. It is really convenient for working with any kind of numeric values thanks to the support of various number formats. You can also insert multiline text in grid cells and apply your own tooltips with any HTML content for showing additional information. Editing operations are performed right in grid cells.

DHTMLX Grid ensures great performance with large amounts of data thanks to lazy loading. It also provides a native user experience on any touchscreen device. The design of this component is based on Material style. If necessary, the appearance of any grid element can be easily adjusted to your needs by adding new CSS classes with the desired settings. Users can export the grid content to Excel or CSV with a single click. The possibility to utilize TypeScript definitions helps to increase the quality of your codebase. It is noteworthy that you can purchase this grid component separately or together with other UI widgets included in DHTMLX Suite.

Resources: documentation, samples

Evaluation version: DHTMLX Grid

FlexGrid (Wijmo)

FlexGrid is one of the numerous JavaScript UI controls included in GrapeCity’s Wijmo library that helps to accelerate the process of adding data tables to your app. The core grid module provides only basic features (sorting, grouping, editing, etc.), but you can utilize extensions to make your grid more functional. For example, you can customize the editing experience by enabling a Popup Editor, Input Method Editor (IME), data entry rules (validation), and other editing options. This lightweight control also supports aggregations, cell merging, dynamic updates, sparklines, tree view, and many more useful features.

Written in TypeScript, this control allows you to benefit from the design-time error checking and IntelliSense code completion in Visual Studio during the development process. This control is also notable for its small footprint (less than 150KB) which helps to keep load time minimal. You can create custom content for FlexGrid cells declaratively by using cell templates for any JS framework. The FlexGrid content can be saved as a PDF or Excel file.

Resources: documentation, samples

Evaluation version: Wijmo

Ignite UI Data Grid

Infragistics delivers a range of enterprise-grade UI components (Ignite UI library) for various web development needs, including data management. Ignite UI Data Grid is a jQuery-based responsive grid component intended for depicting and handling tabular data. Similar to other grid solutions, this component includes a pack of primary user interaction features such as filtering, sorting, grouping, paging, column resizing, summaries, and data editing. But various customization options allow you to expand these traditional capabilities. For example, you can apply templated columns for adding some custom stuff into your grid (buttons, custom data format, graph, etc.), show grouping summaries with custom aggregation functions, create any filtering interfaces with the Filter by Text feature, and more.

Ignite UI Data Grid comes with a couple of features that can have a positive impact on its performance: virtualization, remote paging, remote filtering. The grid supports exporting to Excel. You can utilize this grid component with popular open-source libraries including KnockoutJS, History.js, JsRender, and Bootstrap. If you want to test the capabilities of Ignite UI Data Grid in practice, Infragistics provides an online HTML5 Page Designer tool.

Resources: documentation, samples

Evaluation version: Ignite UI

Sencha Ext JS Grid

Ext JS Grid is a JavaScript UI component designed by Sencha for showing and processing various amounts of data in the form of an interactive table. The feature-set of this component allows you to enable all capabilities that are vital for users when it comes to working with data. In addition, you can also integrate other UI components (charts, buttons, forms, etc.) or pivoting functions. It is interesting to mention that Ext JS Grid utilizes a plugin approach for the implementation of some features such as editing or summaries. You have complete control over the component’s customization.

When working with big data, Ext JS Grid makes use of buffered rendering that allows users to seamlessly scroll through thousands of records. All theming issues for the grid component can be solved by using default themes or by creating your own theme with a special graphical tool named Sencha Themer. Sencha also offers to its customers a collection of other tools that facilitate the integration of Ext JS in your project. Exporting capabilities include Excel, XML, CSV, TSV, HTML formats.

Resources: documentation, samples

Evaluation version: Ext JS

Syncfusion DataGrid

Syncfusion provides a collection of JavaScript controls (Essential JS 2 library) for enriching web apps with various UI elements. The DataGrid control is one of the most demanded UI tools offered by Syncfusion. It is based on a modular architecture, thus you can equip the grid with capabilities that are really needed for your project. And there are plenty of features to choose from. Syncfusion DataGrid comes with a set of essential grid actions that can be customized to meet the needs of your project. For instance, the grid content can be changed via built-in edit modes (inline, dialog, bulk) or with custom editors. You can also make use of various templates to customize the look and behavior of columns and rows in the grid with your own settings.

Using this JavaScript control, you can load huge amounts of data and not worry about any performance decline, since you can enable virtualization and infinite scrolling features. There is also the immutable mode that optimizes the re-rendering process i.e. only new or edited parts of the grid are re-rendered. The design of the DataGrid control is based on the mobile-first approach, thus it automatically adapts to any screen size. You can also save the table content in Excel, PDF, CSV formats and programmatically customize the document (e.g. add a header or footer to it).

Resources: documentation, samples

Evaluation version: Essential JS 2

Webix DataTable

Webix DataTable is a part of the Webix UI widget package designed for presenting data in a table that can be equipped with various built-in sorting, filtering, and grouping modes. It is also possible to set custom behavior for these vital grid operations. Apart from that, you can take advantage of more advanced features such as data validation, math formulas for cells (available via API only), saving current data state, sparklines, rowspan & colspan. This JavaScript control is also notable for numerous editing options, as it comes with 12 editors.

Dynamic loading helps to display large chunks of data without performance limitations, while the paging feature allows you to break down data into several pages for the user’s convenience. If you place several grid tables on one page, you can exchange data between them using drag-and-drop or copy-paste actions. Users can export grid data to PDF or Excel for further processing. Any other Webix UI control can also be incorporated into your data table. 

Resources: documentation, samples

Evaluation version: Webix

Conclusion

As you can see, there are plenty of JavaScript editable table libraries out there. All of them have a lot of useful features that can help to make the user experience with your app more productive. But it's hard to say that any of them will perfectly suit your project. There are many individual aspects that are commonly taken into account when choosing a new instrument for your development stack such as availability of any specific feature, documentation clarity, licensing/pricing options, and many others. The information provided above can give you some little hints, but it is up to you to estimate the practical value of these products and make a final choice.