How to Add Owl Carousel in Your Next.js Project

Carasoul don’t have a good reputation as a web element from UX point of view. Still its a vital element in modern web appearance. Almost all the web sites have it in some form of representation. Weather it is used as a offer promoter of review slider. As it is a very common element in web we can’t use default ones to make us unique. For customizing Owl Caousel has a good reputation over the time because of its flexibility. But Add this in Next.js have some caveat due to next’s SSR or SSG functionality. We cannot use react owl carousel directly beacause of next js default behaviour. In this tutorial we will discuss how can we over come this.

Step 1: Install Owl Carousel Package

Here we have used react owl carousel which is based on owl carousel 2.

To begin, you'll need to install the react owl carousel package. Open your terminal and run the following command to install it using npm:

npm install react-owl-carousel
//for yarn react owl carousel
yarn add react-owl-carousel

Step 2: Import Owl Carousel Files

Once the package is installed, you need to import the necessary Owl Carousel CSS and JavaScript files into your Next.js project. In the file where you want to use the carousel, add the following code at the top:

import "owl.carousel/dist/assets/owl.carousel.css";
import "owl.carousel/dist/assets/owl.theme.default.css";

Step 3: Import Owl Carousel React component

if (typeof window !== "undefined") {
  window.$ = window.jQuery = require("jquery");
}

import dynamic from "next/dynamic";
const OwlCarousel = dynamic(() => import("react-owl-carousel"), {
  ssr: false,
});

Step 3: Set up Compoent

Now we need to call the OwlCarousel Component in the component to render the slider. here Options are the config for owlcaraousel.

  <OwlCarousel className="" {...options}>
  //{..content or silides}
  <OwlCarousel />

For this example my config was below

  const options = {
    animateIn: "animate__fadeIn",
    animateOut: "animate__slideOutDown",

    margin: 30,
    //stagePadding: 30,
    smartSpeed: 450,

    items: 1,

    loop: true,
  };

Step 4: initialize jquery

we missed one step that initialize jquery. We need to initialize jquery before any code.

import React from "react";
var $ = require("jquery");

declare global {
  interface Window {
    $: any;
    jQuery: any;
  }
}

if (typeof window !== "undefined") {
  window.$ = window.jQuery = require("jquery");
}

Step 5: Customize and Style

One of the great things about Owl Carousel is the ability to customize and style your carousel to match your project's requirements. You can define the number of items to display, add navigation buttons, autoplay, and more. Take a look at the Owl Carousel documentation for a complete list of available options and configurations.

Step 6: Enjoy the Carousel!

Congratulations! You have successfully added Owl Carousel to your Next.js project. Now it's time to have some fun and start adding content, images, and customizing the carousel according to your needs. Let your creativity shine!

Final Thoughts

Before wrapping up, it's important to thoroughly test your carousel and make any necessary adjustments to ensure it fits seamlessly into your project. Remember, the goal is to create a beautiful and interactive user experience. To make owl caousel responsive you need to add media query or other css properties

So go ahead and enhance your Next.js project with the captivating Owl Carousel and impress your users with stunning visuals and smooth navigation. Happy coding!