Programming, Vue.js

Easy Way To Have Multiple Layouts For Your Vue.js App

While building most apps we need to have different layouts depending on the route. For example we might have a different base layout for someone logging in (/login) and for someone visiting a dashboard (/dashboard). Let’s go over one of the easy ways to accomplish this with Vue router.

First we need to define the two layouts.

Example Public.vue layout

<template>
    <router-view></router-view>
</template>

<script>
  export default {
    name: 'PublicLayout',
  };
</script>

<style>
</style>

Notice the only template structure we define for the public layout is a <router-view>. Each of your layouts will need the <router-view> that tells Vue to put the contents of the route in there.

Example App.vue layout

<template>
    <div>
        <nav>
            <ul>
                <li><router-link to="/dashboard">Dashboard</router-link></li>
                <li><router-link to="/logout">Logout</router-link></li>
            </ul>
        </nav>
        <div>
            <router-view></router-view>
        </div>

    </div>
</template>

<script>
  export default {
    name: 'AppLayout',
  };
</script>

<style>
</style>

Again notice this layout also has a <router-view>.

Any route that uses this layout will include the nav. We can add in other things like a sidebar, footer, and more, but for demonstration purposes it’s easier to show the concept with less.

Next is the route file. Let’s say we have a couple routes a /login and a /dashboard. /login should have the public layout and /dashboard should have the app layout.

Example route file.

import Vue from 'vue';
import Router from 'vue-router';
import AppLayout from '@/layouts/App.vue';
import PublicLayout from '@/layouts/Public.vue';
import Dashboard from "@/views/Dashboard.vue";

Vue.use(Router);

export default new Router({
  mode: 'history',
  base: process.env.BASE_URL,
  routes: [
    {
      path: '/login',
      component: PublicLayout,
      children: [
        {
          path: '',
          component: Login,
        },
      ],
    },
    {
      path: '/dashboard',
      component: AppLayout,
      children: [
        {
          path: '',
          component: Dashboard,
        },
      ],
    },
  ],
});

There are a couple key concepts. First notice the top level route defines the path. In our example that would be /login or /dashboard. Each of those top level routes define which layout they will use.

/login uses the PublicLayout because the user is not authenticated yet.

/dashboard uses AppLayout and assumes the user is authenticated.

Both /login and /dashboard have a children property on them and each have a path of ''. This tells Vue to display that component for /login and /dashboard by default when that route is visited.

Below is a working example of the above code. If the sandbox doesn’t load properly use https://codesandbox.io/s/vue-layout-demo-mr0oh?fontsize=14.

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