Wave grid

A crisp grid ripples like water around the pointer, bending and lighting up as each wave passes, with a splash ring on click.

element
grid
ripple
water
pointer
shader
since 0.2

Background Studio: tune it below, then copy the code

Your system asks for reduced motion: the demo shows its final state and nothing moves.

Live demo

Wave grid example

Code

It follows the controls above: change an option and the code changes with it.

<script src="https://search.axi0.io/axi0/motion/motion.js" defer></script>

<axi0-wave-grid cover></axi0-wave-grid>

import { WaveGrid } from "./motion/react/WaveGrid";

<WaveGrid />

<script setup lang="ts">
import WaveGrid from "./motion/vue/WaveGrid.vue";
</script>

<template>
  <WaveGrid />
</template>

const fx = document.createElement("axi0-wave-grid");
document.querySelector("#hero").append(fx);

The wrappers: WaveGrid.tsx (React, TypeScript) and WaveGrid.vue (Vue). Both render the same attributes as the HTML; the loader does the rest.

Options

Attribute	Default	What it does
`cell`	`34`	Grid cell size
`ripple`	`1`	How hard the waves bend and light the grid
`colors`	auto	Colors, comma separated (empty: the palette for the page's theme)
`background`	auto	Background color (empty: the theme's)
`speed`	`1`	How fast it moves
`theme`	`auto`	Light or dark palette (auto: from the page behind it)
`cover`	`false`	Fill the nearest positioned parent, behind its content

Decorative: the canvas is aria-hidden and takes no focus; with cover it ignores the pointer, so the content above it stays clickable and readable. With no pointer the waves start from a wandering point, so touch and keyboard users see the same scene; a tap splashes like a click. Drawn by the shared WebGL runner below device resolution (never more than one pixel per CSS pixel, device pixel ratio capped at 2); it starts when it comes within 300 px of the screen, the frame loop stops off screen and in hidden tabs, and reduced motion draws one still frame with no movement. Without WebGL it shows a still gradient in its own colors.

Size

wave-grid.js is 0.8 KB gzip, with gl.js 2.1 KB and backgrounds-kit.js 3.4 KB it needs. A page loads the loader (2.9 KB) and core.js (1.4 KB) once, whatever it uses.