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Dev tools · alternatives · 2026

24 alternatives to Ripl – A unified 2D/3D engine for Canvas, SVG, WebGPU, and the Terminal

After several years, with a small hiatus in the middle, I've finally got Ripl to the point of being published. Ripl is a library for rendering 2D and 3D shapes to any context (canvas, SVG, WebGPU, and Terminal supported by default) using a single API. The library mimics the DOM as much as possible, replicating the event system, object graphing, CSS-like querying, gradients, and keyframe animations etc. I also built a complete data visualization library using the core package which is available as @ripl/charts. And yes, you can even render the charts to a terminal with about a 2-3 line…

Ripl is a rendering library that lets developers draw 2D and 3D shapes using a single API across Canvas, SVG, WebGPU, and Terminal outputs. It mimics DOM functionality with event systems, CSS-like querying, gradients… Below are 24 products that do a similar job, ranked by how close each is in meaning and then by launch-day votes.

  1. 1

    Here's a project I've been working on for a little while now. Ripl is a JS library that provides a unified API for rendering shapes on both canvas and SVG interchangeably. Over the years I've used D3 extensively to create data visualisations so I figured I'd have a go at making my own version with a slightly more modern API and stricter TypeScript support. I am aware there are already libraries that can draw to multiple contexts interchangeably, but I've added a few little niceties to Ripl that (as far as I know) some other libraries don't have such as CSS-like query selectors, DOM-like…

    2024 · github.com · its alternatives →

  2. 2
    Ripl▲4

    One unified API for rendering on the web and in the terminal

    Jul 2026 · ripl.run · its alternatives →

  3. 3

    Render 3D models (OBJ, glTF, GLB, STL, .vox) as ASCII art — in the browser, in React or Vue, or straight in your terminal. A three.js-style API with no WebGL and no canvas: just text in a single <pre>.

    Jun 2026 · glyphcss.com · its alternatives →

  4. 4
    Render▲318

    Hey HN, I'm Anurag, founder and CEO of Render, a cloud for application developers. We've just launched Render Workflows, a way to define durable tasks by decorating plain TypeScript or Python functions and running them on Render without operating queues, worker pools, retry logic, and state management. Code example below [1]. The use cases we have in mind include agent loops, ETL&#x2F;data pipelines, billing flows, and other long-running jobs. The model is simple: mark an existing function as a Task, deploy the repo as a Workflow, then trigger runs from your application code or via our API.…

    2019 · render.com · its alternatives →

  5. 5

    Pts is a javascript library for visualization and creative-coding.

    2018 · ptsjs.org · its alternatives →

  6. 6

    Many JS libraries exist to build graphs on the web (Vega, chartJS, Plotly...). They allow to make charts quickly. But you lose flexibility: you're limited by the options they offer. I just created a gallery with hundreds of graphs made with d3.js and React. - Examples are split by graph types - They all come with explanation and code sandboxes - Gradual complexity to ease the learning curve It took me ages to create this project! Feedback welcome!

    2023 · react-graph-gallery.com · its alternatives →

  7. 7

    Hey HN! We're Ben and Izak, founders of Repaint (YC S23). Repaint is like Figma, but for creating real websites. It has panning, zooming, and dragging elements around. The settings closely follow html&#x2F;css. We think an open canvas is a big improvement over other website builders. Everything is easier: styling, consistency, responsiveness… But making it work was hard! We thought HN would appreciate the tech behind it: - A custom WebGL rendering engine (w&#x2F;text, shadows, blurs, gradients, & opacity groups) - A partial implementation of the css spec - A custom text editor & text shaper…

    2024 · repaint.com · its alternatives →

  8. 8

    A fast, multipurpose and lightweight JavaScript animation library

    2016 · anime-js.com · its alternatives →

  9. 9

    Creator here. I built ChartGPU because I kept hitting the same wall: charting libraries that claim to be "fast" but choke past 100K data points. The core insight: Canvas2D is fundamentally CPU-bound. Even WebGL chart libraries still do most computation on the CPU. So I moved everything to the GPU via WebGPU: - LTTB downsampling runs as a compute shader - Hit-testing for tooltips&#x2F;hover is GPU-accelerated - Rendering uses instanced draws (one draw call per series) The result: 1M points at 60fps with smooth zoom&#x2F;pan. Live demo:…

    Jan 2026 · github.com · its alternatives →

  10. 10

    Voxel-engine in Javascript. Contribute to Lallassu/voxelengine3 development by creating an account on GitHub.

    2017 · github.com · its alternatives →

  11. 11TJ

    A JavaScript Library for creating SVG patterns

    2015 · riccardoscalco.github.io · its alternatives →

  12. 12AD

    A simple and fast zero-dependencies-library to transform text-selections into serializable markings.

    2015 · bowlingx.github.io · its alternatives →

  13. 13
  14. 14RJ

    A JavaScript library for programming graphic design systems with SVG

    2015 · runemadsen.github.io · its alternatives →

  15. 15

    I'm Robbert, the creator of DataGridXL.js. Last month I released version 2 which includes many new features. DataGridXL is a free (and commercial) editable data table library written in ES6. My goal is to develop the most performant & user-friendly spreadsheet-like data table out there: - It has zero dependencies. You don’t need any framework to use DataGridXL. - It is lightweight (~250kb) and easy to use. It does not even require messing with CSS. - It has its own Virtual DOM implementation to prevent DOM errors. - Developer friendly. Supports all modern web browsers Please take a look at…

    2022 · datagridxl.com · its alternatives →

  16. 16

    A multi-threaded, GPU-powered, 2D vector graphics environment for Node.js - samizdatco/skia-canvas

    2020 · github.com · its alternatives →

  17. 17DR

    I'd like to invite everyone to try out DontBeEvil.rip, an experimental search engine for developers. tl;dr $ alias rip="curl -G -H 'Accept: text&#x2F;plain' --url https:&#x2F;&#x2F;dontbeevil.rip&#x2F;search --data-urlencode " $ rip 'q=Heartbleed bug' DontBeEvil.rip is a year long experiment to see if a small team can build a developer-focused search engine that is self-sustaining on $10 monthly subscriptions. It works by only indexing high-quality resources that are relevant to developers. You won't get useless listicles because we'll never crawl them. Relevant urls are harvested from HN,…

    2022 · its alternatives →

  18. 18

    A CSS 3D engine for the DOM. Renders polygon meshes in HTML by leveraging matrix3d transforms. - GitHub - layoutit/polycss: A CSS 3D engine for the DOM. Renders polygon meshes in HTML by leveraging matrix3d transforms.

    Jun 2026 · github.com · its alternatives →

  19. 19

    Render multiple moving rectangles to compare a number of canvas engines.

    2020 · benchmarks.slaylines.io · its alternatives →

  20. 20

    ScreenChunk is an ultra-fast live Screen Capture studio and WebRTC screen recorder. Capture your desktop, crop 2D regions, and broadcast live streams with zero-knowledge AES-256-GCM chunk protection.

    2017 · screen.rip · its alternatives →

  21. 21

    I've been going through Cem Yuksel's "Introduction to Computer Graphics" course and thought that writing a volume renderer would be a good way to test my knowledge. It is a common technique used to render 3D medical data. Works by ray marching a specific step size, reading a 3D texture (e.g. MRI data), and calculating opacity values. Code should be easy to get started with for anyone familiar with the JS ecosystem. Questions for the HN community: I spent 20-25% of the entire time just setting up the project and fighting issues with the JavaScript ecosystem. This experience has made me…

    2024 · github.com · its alternatives →

  22. 22
    Zdog▲211

    3D javascript engine for canvas and SVG

    2019 · its alternatives →

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Ranked by how close each launch is in meaning, then by votes. Prices were read from each product’s own site when checked and can change. Refine with your own description →