The latest articles on DEV Community by Sami Odeh (@sami_odeh_03abe6ce75464fd). https://dev.to/sami_odeh_03abe6ce75464fd https://media2.dev.to/dynamic/image/width=90,height=90,fit=cover,gravity=auto,format=auto/https:%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fuploads%2Fuser%2Fprofile_image%2F3824790%2F2bc576b3-a41d-42a0-908e-a6115b1f7c6d.jpg https://dev.to/sami_odeh_03abe6ce75464fd en Sami Odeh Sun, 15 Mar 2026 03:22:16 +0000 https://dev.to/sami_odeh_03abe6ce75464fd/building-a-high-performance-drag-and-drop-table-library-for-react-19fo https://dev.to/sami_odeh_03abe6ce75464fd/building-a-high-performance-drag-and-drop-table-library-for-react-19fo <p>Tables are everywhere in React apps — admin panels, dashboards, analytics tools, and data grids.</p> <p>One thing that’s surprisingly tricky to implement well is drag-and-drop reordering, especially when you want:</p> <ul> <li>row reordering</li> <li>column reordering</li> <li>smooth animations</li> <li>good performance with large datasets</li> </ul> <p>Most existing solutions rely heavily on React re-renders during drag operations, which can become slow when working with large tables.</p> <p>So I built a small library called flexitablesort.</p> <p>What it does</p> <p>flexitablesort enables drag-and-drop row and column reordering for React tables with a focus on performance and minimal dependencies.</p> <p>Key features:</p> <ul> <li>Row and column drag support</li> <li>Smooth animations using direct DOM transforms</li> <li>Auto-scroll when dragging near container edges</li> <li>Works with virtual scrolling (tested with "@tanstack/react-virtual")</li> <li>No external UI framework required</li> <li>Fully styleable components</li> <li>Event delegation for performance</li> </ul> <p>Demo</p> <p>Live demo and documentation:</p> <p><a href="https://samiodeh1337.github.io/sortable-table/" rel="noopener noreferrer">https://samiodeh1337.github.io/sortable-table/</a></p> <p>Install</p> <p>npm install flexitablesort</p> <p>Why I built it</p> <p>I wanted a lightweight solution for sortable tables that:</p> <ul> <li>doesn’t require a large drag-and-drop framework</li> <li>works smoothly with large datasets</li> <li>stays flexible enough to integrate into custom table layouts</li> </ul> <p>Feedback welcome</p> <p>I built this pretty quickly and haven’t fully battle-tested it yet, so I’d really appreciate feedback from other React developers.</p> <p>GitHub:</p> <p><a href="https://github.com/samiodeh1337/sortable-table" rel="noopener noreferrer">https://github.com/samiodeh1337/sortable-table</a></p> <p>npm:</p> <p><a href="https://www.npmjs.com/package/flexitablesort" rel="noopener noreferrer">https://www.npmjs.com/package/flexitablesort</a></p> <p>If you try it out, let me know what works well and what could be improved!</p> react javascript typescript webdev