--- name: tailwindcss-development description: >- Styles applications using Tailwind CSS v4 utilities. Activates when adding styles, restyling components, working with gradients, spacing, layout, flex, grid, responsive design, dark mode, colors, typography, or borders; or when the user mentions CSS, styling, classes, Tailwind, restyle, hero section, cards, buttons, or any visual/UI changes. --- # Tailwind CSS Development ## When to Apply Activate this skill when: - Adding styles to components or pages - Working with responsive design - Implementing dark mode - Extracting repeated patterns into components - Debugging spacing or layout issues ## Documentation Use `search-docs` for detailed Tailwind CSS v4 patterns and documentation. ## Basic Usage - Use Tailwind CSS classes to style HTML. Check and follow existing Tailwind conventions in the project before introducing new patterns. - Offer to extract repeated patterns into components that match the project's conventions (e.g., Blade, JSX, Vue). - Consider class placement, order, priority, and defaults. Remove redundant classes, add classes to parent or child elements carefully to reduce repetition, and group elements logically. ## Tailwind CSS v4 Specifics - Always use Tailwind CSS v4 and avoid deprecated utilities. - `corePlugins` is not supported in Tailwind v4. ### CSS-First Configuration In Tailwind v4, configuration is CSS-first using the `@theme` directive — no separate `tailwind.config.js` file is needed: @theme { --color-brand: oklch(0.72 0.11 178); } ### Import Syntax In Tailwind v4, import Tailwind with a regular CSS `@import` statement instead of the `@tailwind` directives used in v3: - @tailwind base; - @tailwind components; - @tailwind utilities; + @import "tailwindcss"; ### Replaced Utilities Tailwind v4 removed deprecated utilities. Use the replacements shown below. Opacity values remain numeric. | Deprecated | Replacement | |------------|-------------| | bg-opacity-* | bg-black/* | | text-opacity-* | text-black/* | | border-opacity-* | border-black/* | | divide-opacity-* | divide-black/* | | ring-opacity-* | ring-black/* | | placeholder-opacity-* | placeholder-black/* | | flex-shrink-* | shrink-* | | flex-grow-* | grow-* | | overflow-ellipsis | text-ellipsis | | decoration-slice | box-decoration-slice | | decoration-clone | box-decoration-clone | ## Spacing Use `gap` utilities instead of margins for spacing between siblings:

Item 1

Item 2

## Dark Mode If existing pages and components support dark mode, new pages and components must support it the same way, typically using the `dark:` variant:

Content adapts to color scheme

## Common Patterns ### Flexbox Layout

Left content

Right content

### Grid Layout

Card 1

Card 2

Card 3

## Common Pitfalls - Using deprecated v3 utilities (bg-opacity-*, flex-shrink-*, etc.) - Using `@tailwind` directives instead of `@import "tailwindcss"` - Trying to use `tailwind.config.js` instead of CSS `@theme` directive - Using margins for spacing between siblings instead of gap utilities - Forgetting to add dark mode variants when the project uses dark mode

tailwindcss-development

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