# Fomantic-UI: the maintained fork of Semantic-UI, and when to use it > Fomantic-UI is the community fork that keeps Semantic-UI alive under the MIT licence. It suits teams that want Semantic-UI's HTML vocabulary without an abandoned upstream, and it stops being the right choice the moment a project expects a React component library. **fomantic/Fomantic-UI** — Fomantic-UI is the official community fork of Semantic-UI - Repository: https://github.com/fomantic/Fomantic-UI - Website: https://fomantic-ui.com - Stars: 3,765 · Forks: 340 - Language: JavaScript - License: MIT - Published: 2026-09-23 · Updated: 2026-09-23 · Language: en - Canonical page: https://hysenlabs.com/projects/fomantic-fomantic-ui ## What Fomantic-UI is, and the problem the fork solves Semantic-UI was a framework for writing interfaces in HTML that reads like English: a button is a class on a button element, and the JavaScript layer attaches behaviour to that markup. Its development stopped. The README of Fomantic-UI states plainly that the project was created to continue active development of Semantic-UI, with the stated intent of merging back into the master repository once development there can restart. That intent is repeated in a later note pointing at issue 319, where v3 development is discussed. So the problem Fomantic-UI solves is not a missing feature. It is continuity. Teams that had Semantic-UI in production faced a choice between freezing a dependency and rewriting their views. Fomantic-UI offers a third path: the same class vocabulary, a repository that still receives commits, and an MIT licence carried over from the original. The last push to the develop branch was on 2026-09-21, which is recent enough that the project cannot be described as dormant. The audience is narrow but real. It is people who are comfortable writing markup and want the framework to stay out of the way, rather than people who want components defined in JavaScript and composed in a render function. The README frames the value as concise HTML, intuitive JavaScript and simplified debugging. That is a description of a class-based framework, not of a component runtime. ## How the build works: LESS source, gulp tasks, and a generated dist The repository is not consumed directly. The top level holds src/, tasks/, scripts/ and a gulpfile.js, and package.json exposes build, lint and lint-fix scripts. The build script is gulp build. Source styles are written in LESS, and the package dependencies include gulp-less, gulp-autoprefixer, gulp-clean-css, gulp-rtlcss and gulp-concat, which describes the pipeline: compile LESS, add vendor prefixes, produce a right-to-left variant, concatenate and minify. The output lands in dist/, and package.json points main at dist/semantic.js while types points at ./types/index.d.ts. That combination matters. The package ships compiled JavaScript and TypeScript declarations, but the CSS and the LESS variables a theme would override are not in the main entry, which is why the README lists separate packages: fomantic-ui-css for CSS only, fomantic-ui-less for LESS, and a third-party SASS gem, fomantic-ui-sass. Choosing the wrong one is the most common way to end up with components that render but do not respond to clicks. There is also an interactive installer, described in the README as part of the setup flow, and a semantic.json.example at the repository root that shows the shape of the configuration the installer writes. The getting started and theming guides on fomantic-ui.com are where the README sends readers for details. ## Installing Fomantic-UI and building a first page The README gives one install command for the full package. Run it in your project root. ```bash npm install fomantic-ui ``` If you want unreleased fixes, the README documents a nightly channel with the same package name and a dist-tag. ```bash npm install fomantic-ui@nightly ``` After installing, the README says Fomantic ships an interactive installer to help set up a project. That installer is what writes the semantic.json configuration file; semantic.json.example in the repository root shows the expected keys. If you would rather not run the installer, the CSS-only package is the shortest route to a styled page: ```bash npm install fomantic-ui-css ``` The repository ships examples/ with standalone pages, including login.html, grid.html, sticky.html, theming.html and a bootstrap.html comparison page. Opening examples/login.html in a browser is the fastest way to see what the class vocabulary produces before you wire anything into a real application. Note that the README does not document a rollback path for the installer, so keep the generated semantic.json under version control from the first run. ## Browser targets and the constraint they impose The README lists minimum versions: Chrome and Edge 108, Safari 15.4, Firefox 101, Opera 80, Samsung Internet 21, iOS 15.4 and Android 10. These are not decorative. A framework built on modern CSS layout primitives cannot be transpiled down the way a JavaScript bundle can, so a project that still supports an older Android browser or an older Safari cannot simply add a polyfill and move on. That cutoff is the honest cost of the fork's willingness to modernise. If your support matrix includes browsers below those versions, Fomantic-UI is the wrong tool and no build flag will fix it. The same applies if your organisation pins a browser version for compliance reasons. Check the list against your analytics before evaluating anything else, because this is the one constraint that no amount of theming or configuration can work around. ## Where Fomantic-UI is the wrong choice: React and component runtimes Fomantic-UI manipulates the DOM directly. A component that renders and re-renders from a virtual DOM will fight that model, because the framework's JavaScript expects to own the element it was initialised on and to be told when that element is removed. The README does not present a React binding, and the related search traffic around Fomantic-UI and React is a sign of people looking for something the project does not ship. There is a second limitation worth naming. The release history is uneven. Version 2.9.4 was published on 2025-02-23, and the release before it, 2.9.3, was published on 2023-09-07. That is roughly seventeen months between releases. Commits to develop continue, as the 2026-09-21 last push shows, but a team that needs a tagged release for every fix should plan around the nightly build or accept waiting. Finally, the project's own README says v3 development is starting and links to an issue thread of proposals. That means the framework you adopt today is the one whose successor is still being designed. If your timeline assumes a stable v3 with a published migration guide, the repository does not yet provide one. ## Fomantic-UI vs Semantic-UI and vs Bootstrap The comparison with Semantic-UI is the one the project itself invites. The codebase is a fork, the licence is the same MIT, and the class names are largely the same, so the practical difference is not the API but the release cadence and the issue tracker. On Semantic-UI, development stopped; on Fomantic-UI, the README says the intent is to continue it and eventually merge back. If you are already running Semantic-UI, switching means changing the package source rather than rewriting templates, which is why the fork exists at all. The comparison with Bootstrap is a difference in philosophy rather than in feature count. Bootstrap defines components through utility classes and a grid, with a JavaScript layer for interactive widgets. Fomantic-UI defines components as named elements with a shared vocabulary, and its theming model is built on LESS variables compiled through the gulp pipeline rather than on CSS custom properties. If your team already has a Bootstrap design system with overrides, moving to Fomantic-UI means rebuilding that layer in LESS. If your team prefers writing semantic markup and letting the framework style it, the reverse is true. For CSS-only consumption, fomantic-ui-css is the relevant package. It gives you the stylesheet without the JavaScript components, which is a reasonable choice when your application already has its own dropdown, modal or tab implementation. The README lists it alongside the LESS and SASS packages in a table, and it is worth reading that table before installing, because the full fomantic-ui package is the one that carries the build toolchain. ## Licence and the cost of keeping the fork current Fomantic-UI is MIT licensed, as stated in package.json and in LICENSE.md. The MIT terms permit commercial use, modification and redistribution provided the copyright notice and permission notice are retained. That is the same licence Semantic-UI used, so a migration from one to the other does not change your obligations. This is a description of the licence text, not legal advice; if your organisation has a licence review process, the file to send is LICENSE.md. The upgrade cost is dominated by the build, not by the API. Because theming goes through LESS variables compiled by gulp, a major version bump can change variable names, and the repository keeps a CHANGELOG.md at the root for exactly that reason. A project that consumed fomantic-ui-css and only overrode classes has a much smaller upgrade surface than one that compiled its own theme from source. If you are on the full package, pin the version in package.json and read CHANGELOG.md before moving, rather than tracking the nightly dist-tag in production. ## Conclusion Adopt Fomantic-UI if you already write Semantic-UI classes and need a repository that still takes commits, or if you want a framework whose JavaScript is jQuery-era and whose build can be themed through LESS. Do not adopt it for a React codebase, and do not expect the CSS-only package to include the JavaScript components. Before committing, check the release history: 2.9.3 sat from 2023-09-07 to 2025-02-23, so verify that the fixes you need are in 2.9.4 or in the nightly build, and read the v3 proposal thread before you plan a migration. ## FAQ ### What is Fomantic-UI? It is the official community fork of Semantic-UI, described in its README as created to continue active development of Semantic-UI with the intent of merging back into the master repository later. It is MIT licensed, written primarily in JavaScript, and installed from npm. ### How does Fomantic-UI differ from Semantic-UI? The class vocabulary and the MIT licence carry over from Semantic-UI; what changes is that Fomantic-UI's develop branch still receives commits, with the last push on 2026-09-21. The README states the project intends to merge back into Semantic-UI once development there can restart. ### Is Fomantic-UI a replacement for Bootstrap? They take different approaches: Fomantic-UI styles named markup elements and themes through LESS variables compiled by gulp, while Bootstrap centres on utility classes and a grid. Moving between them means rebuilding your override layer, not swapping a stylesheet. ### What is an alternative to Fomantic-UI? Semantic-UI itself is the origin the fork was taken from, but the README says development there stopped and that Fomantic-UI intends to merge back if it restarts. Bootstrap is the other common comparison, and it structures components around utility classes and a grid rather than named elements. ## Sources - [fomantic/Fomantic-UI on GitHub](https://github.com/fomantic/Fomantic-UI) - [License: MIT](https://github.com/fomantic/Fomantic-UI/blob/develop/LICENSE) - [Project website](https://fomantic-ui.com) - [README](https://github.com/fomantic/Fomantic-UI/blob/develop/README.md) - [Releases](https://github.com/fomantic/Fomantic-UI/releases) --- Hysen Labs editorial analysis, written from the project's own repository and release notes. Cite the canonical page: https://hysenlabs.com/projects/fomantic-fomantic-ui