A few people I know have been complaining that Bootstrap is heavy and slows your site down because of unnecessary styles yada yada yada. Personally I love Bootstrap and don’t find it slows down any of the sites I’ve developed using it.

So I decided to follow Jesus, no turning back and to try another CSS framework. W3 CSS is one of those that I decided to give it a try and, too be honest, it’s faster than Bootstrap.

However, it is limited and flat. I’ve grown accustomed to Bootstrap’s styles, mouseovers, tooltips, popovers, in focus borders, etc. I still decided to give it a shot and besides being flat (did I say that already?) it’s a good framework. If you have a very good grasp on CSS then you can transform W3 CSS to make it our own, and that’s what I did.

Pretending that I never used Bootstrap before, I incorporated W3 CSS into a FIFA Tracker like project that I’m working on. Going through the W3 Schools site tutorials was easy and my knowledge of Bootstrap helped me to grasp it quickly even though I was pretending not to have ever used Bootstrap before hahaha.

In the end, I liked it. I liked it a lot! I’m a fan of bright colours and their default colours are just that, bright. Their panels are good and can be enhanced with built-in classes (shadows and rounded corners for example) just like Bootstrap. The cards are fun to use and with some imagination, and CSS know-how, they can be transformed into works of art. The buttons, similar to Bootstrap, can be rounded or square with varying sizes and colours. There are even some built-in animation classes which eliminate the need for AOS for example (I’m stretching it, AOS is freaking awesome! But you get my drift). If you want to mimic a Material Design, you can. It’s a really good framework and I’m very happy I tested it out.

I enjoyed using W3 CSS and would encourage anyone to give it a try. It’s not a powerhouse like Bootstrap but it does an excellent job and is lighter than using the entire Bootstrap library. So, go ahead and give it a try, W3 CSS might just surprise you.

Tags: bootstrap alternative, css, w3