A Magic UI Alternative with More Than Animations
Magic UI and Watermelon UI are both free, MIT licensed, and install through the shadcn CLI. Choose Watermelon when you want animated components plus the rest of the app: 180+ page blocks, dashboard templates, and 500+ standard component variants.
At a glance
| Watermelon UI | Magic UI | |
|---|---|---|
| Price and license | Free, MIT | Free, MIT, plus paid Magic UI Pro (one-time) |
| How you use it | Copy-paste, installs with the shadcn CLI | Copy-paste, installs with the shadcn CLI |
| Styling | Tailwind CSS v4 | Tailwind CSS v4 |
| Animated components | Yes, 130+ Motion-based animated components | Yes, Motion-based animations are the focus |
| Page sections and dashboards | 180+ blocks, dashboards, templates | Pro templates |
Where Magic UI is stronger
- It is focused and popular, with over 20,000 GitHub stars and a well-known set of landing page effects.
- It has a native shadcn registry namespace,
@magicui.
Why pick Watermelon
- You get the whole catalog free, with no Pro tier.
- It includes product UI animations, like cards, widgets, tabs, and inputs, alongside marketing effects.
- It has standard components like data tables and date pickers, so you need fewer libraries.
Frequently asked questions
Is Magic UI free?
The open source library is free and MIT licensed. Magic UI Pro is a paid, one-time purchase.