How to Preview JSX, TSX, Vue & Markdown Files Without Setting Up a Full Project

There is a small problem that many developers encounter but rarely talk about:

You have a file, but you don't have an easy way to see what it looks like.

This became especially noticeable to me after I started using AI coding tools.

Today, you can ask an AI to generate a dashboard, landing page, settings screen, portfolio, or even an entire application UI. Instead of getting a single HTML file, the AI may give you something like:

App.jsx
Dashboard.tsx
Login.vue
README.md
styles.scss
icon.svg

Opening the file is easy.

Previewing it is a different story.

That problem is what led me to build Preview Kit.

The JSX problem

Imagine that you ask an AI:

Create a modern SaaS dashboard using React.

A few seconds later, you get a file called:

Dashboard.jsx

Now you want to see the interface.

With HTML, the workflow is familiar:

index.html → double-click → browser

With JSX, things can become much more complicated.

JSX is used to describe React UI, so simply opening the file as a normal document does not automatically give you the rendered React interface. Depending on what the file contains, you may need a React environment, dependencies, a bundler, or a development server.

There are already browser extensions specifically designed around the problem of previewing standalone JSX/TSX files without setting up a React development environment, which is a good indication that this is a real workflow problem rather than a theoretical one.

But I kept thinking:

Why do I need to create a complete development environment just to preview one file?

AI made this problem more common

Before AI coding became mainstream, I usually started with a project.

Now I often start with a prompt.

The workflow can look like this:

Idea
  ↓
Ask AI
  ↓
AI generates JSX/TSX
  ↓
I want to see the result

The generation part is incredibly fast.

The problem comes at the last step.

You have the code, but you still need to figure out how to preview it.

This has become particularly relevant with AI-generated UI experiments. Developers are increasingly receiving standalone JSX and TSX files from AI tools and looking for ways to inspect those files without creating a complete application around them.

That led me to a simple question:

What if previewing a code file could be as easy as opening an image?

JSX isn't the only file with this problem

Once I started working on this idea, I realized that JSX was only one part of the problem.

Modern development involves many different file formats.

TSX

React projects frequently use TypeScript with JSX, producing .tsx files.

You can open a TSX file in an editor, but opening it as text and actually seeing the rendered UI are two different things.

Vue

Vue components commonly use .vue single-file components.

They contain templates, scripts and styles together.

Again, sometimes you don't want to start a complete Vue project.

You just want to inspect the component.

Markdown

Markdown is another perfect example.

A file might contain:

# My Project

This is an **important** note.

- First item
- Second item

Opening the file as plain text shows the Markdown syntax.

But what you really want to see is the rendered document.

This is why Markdown preview functionality is so common in developer tools. Even dedicated file-preview libraries provide separate Markdown rendering instead of treating .md files as ordinary text.

SVG

SVG creates another interesting situation.

An SVG file is technically text/XML, but when you're working with an icon or illustration, you usually don't want to inspect hundreds of lines of XML.

You want to see:

the image.

So I built Preview Kit

The idea behind Preview Kit is simple:

If I have the file, I should be able to preview the file without turning it into a full project first.

Preview Kit is a Windows application designed around quick file previewing.

It supports formats such as:

JSX
TSX
HTML
Vue
Markdown
JSON
CSS
SCSS

and more.

The goal isn't to replace your IDE.

It isn't trying to replace React.

It isn't trying to replace Vue.

And it isn't another full development environment.

It solves a much smaller problem:

You already have the file. You just want to see it.

A different workflow for AI-generated code

Here's where I think tools like Preview Kit become especially useful.

Suppose you ask an AI to design a login page.

The AI returns:

LoginPage.jsx

Instead of immediately creating a React project, installing packages and configuring a development environment, you can first preview the file.

Then you can decide whether the design is actually useful.

Maybe the sidebar is too large.

Maybe the buttons are too small.

Maybe the spacing looks wrong.

Maybe you want a completely different layout.

You can send that feedback back to the AI.

Then preview the next version.

The workflow becomes:

Prompt
   ↓
AI generates UI
   ↓
Preview
   ↓
Give feedback
   ↓
AI improves UI
   ↓
Preview again

That feedback loop can be much faster when you are experimenting with designs.

Preview first. Build later.

This is the part that matters most to me.

A generated component is not always a finished application.

Sometimes it is just an experiment.

Sometimes it is a mockup.

Sometimes it is a prototype.

Sometimes you just want to know:

“Does this look good?”

Creating an entire React or Vue project for every small experiment adds friction.

A lightweight preview workflow lets you separate two things:

Seeing what something looks like

from

Building it into a real application

Those are not always the same task.

Previewing developer files should be easier

We already accept this idea for many other file types.

You double-click an image and see the image.

You open a PDF and see the document.

You open a video and watch the video.

So when someone gives you a frontend component, why should the first step be:

Install Node.

Create a project.

Install dependencies.

Configure the tooling.

Start a server.

Then finally see the component.

Sometimes that's necessary.

But sometimes it feels like using a construction site just to look at a chair.

Who is Preview Kit for?

Preview Kit was originally inspired by my own problem, but I think it can be useful for several types of users.

AI-assisted developers

If you frequently use ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Cursor, or other AI coding tools, you may regularly receive JSX, TSX, HTML, Vue, Markdown or other frontend files.

Preview Kit gives you a faster way to inspect them.

Frontend developers

Sometimes you're debugging or testing an individual component and don't want to spend time rebuilding a full environment just for a quick inspection.

Designers

Developers increasingly send design concepts as actual frontend code.

A quick preview can make it easier to review those ideas.

Beginners

Learning React or Vue can involve a lot of setup.

Being able to inspect a component without immediately understanding the entire toolchain can make experimentation less intimidating.

Anyone working with developer files

You may not even be a frontend developer.

You may just have a .md, .svg, .json, .css, .scss or other file and want to see its contents in a useful form.

The original reason I built it

The story behind Preview Kit is actually pretty simple.

I was building a Windows application using AI.

Like many people, I asked the AI to create a demo UI for me.

Instead of giving me an HTML file, it gave me a JSX file.

That was new to me.

I had always worked with HTML, so opening an HTML file was trivial.

But when I tried to open the JSX file, I realized that the same workflow didn't apply.

So I searched:

How do I open a JSX file?

I searched Google.

I asked AI.

I looked at different approaches.

Most of the answers were focused on setting up React or using a development environment.

But that wasn't really what I was looking for.

I wasn't trying to become a React build-system expert.

I simply wanted to see the UI that the AI had generated.

Then I had an idea.

If I had this problem, other people using AI-generated code would probably have it too.

And if JSX had this problem, other modern file formats probably did as well.

That's where the idea for Preview Kit started.

The bigger idea

I don't think the future of software development is only about writing more code.

It's also about reducing the friction around the code that AI generates.

AI can generate a file in seconds.

The next challenge is often understanding, previewing, reviewing and iterating on that file.

Tools that make those steps easier can become useful parts of the AI-assisted development workflow.

Preview Kit is my attempt at solving one small part of that problem.

Try it when you just want to see the file

The next time an AI gives you something like:

component.jsx
page.tsx
Button.vue
README.md
styles.scss
icon.svg

before creating a whole new project, ask yourself:

Do I really need the full environment right now?

Maybe you just need a preview.

That's the idea behind Preview Kit.

Open the file. Preview it. Decide what to do next.

Preview Kit is available for Windows through the Microsoft Store.

Get Preview Kit on the Microsoft Store