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Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteDriver Scan →Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsFix Now →You can build a React “liquid glass” panel that visibly bends what sits behind it, and Snell’s law is the maths that decides how far each pixel shifts. There is no single standard way to do it, though. The projects surfaced here take three routes: an SVG displacement filter on live DOM, a CSS/SVG approach driven by a Snell–Descartes calculation, and WebGL rendering. Each route trades off what content can be refracted, how it behaves across browsers, and how much setup it needs.
What Snell’s law does in a UI effect
Snell’s law relates the angle of incidence to the angle of refraction when light crosses a boundary between two media with different refractive indices. In a browser, you don’t trace real light. You take a surface normal at each point of the glass shape, assume an index of refraction, work out the bent direction, and use it to choose which part of the background to show at that pixel. The result is a displacement map: pixels near a curved edge pull their color from somewhere else.
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The GLSL refract function does this calculation for shader code, and a shader textbook, The OpenGL Shading Language, Third Edition (a surfaced PDF copy), describes it as applying Snell’s law. WebGlass, a web project, describes per-pixel Snell–Descartes refraction with a signed-distance-field bezel.
Using the equation does not make the result a complete glass simulation. These effects bend a sampled background. They don’t model everything real glass does, so treat “Snell’s law” as a description of the displacement step, not a guarantee of physical accuracy.
#1 Best Overall
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The three approaches
SVG displacement on live DOM
The @samasante/liquid-glass repository says it applies an SVG displacement filter to an element, so text stays selectable and links stay clickable. Its README claims rendering in Chrome, Safari and Firefox, and its documentation distinguishes DOM refraction from WebGL surfaces. These are the project’s own claims. Check the current package against your own browsers and content.
CSS/SVG with an optical displacement map
WebGlass describes deriving normals numerically, applying Snell–Descartes refraction, and encoding the resulting displacement into SVG maps. It exposes parameters for refraction, bezel width, blur and displacement scale. That makes it a useful reference for how the maths becomes a filter. It is a description of one project’s implementation, not proof that every browser renders the effect identically.
Rank #2
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WebGL rendering
The @el-gladiador/liquid-glass-react repository describes one shared WebGL2 context, a three-layer refraction effect and a sampled Gaussian blur. Its documentation sets up the context on the client and uses a provider to manage the shared renderer. Confirm WebGL2 availability on your target devices. The README describes the design and does not report measured performance.
How to choose
| Question | SVG/CSS displacement | WebGL |
|---|---|---|
| What gets refracted | Live DOM behind or inside the element, per the @samasante README |
Depends on the library; check whether it samples a supplied image, video, canvas or a captured surface |
| Interactivity of content | Text selectable and links clickable, per the project | Not stated in the surfaced material |
| Setup | Filter and map definitions | Client-side context plus a provider |
| Browser behavior | Claimed for Chrome, Safari, Firefox; verify | Requires WebGL2; verify on target devices |
| Performance | No independent benchmark found | No independent benchmark found |
The surfaced material contains no independent benchmarks or side-by-side tests, so no approach can be declared the winner. The deciding question is usually the first row: does the effect need to bend real, interactive page content, or a known image or canvas?
Rank #3
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Test before you commit
- Run the current package version with your real text, links, scrolling and animation behind and inside the glass.
- Test every browser and device you support, including a device without WebGL2 if you choose that route.
- Define a fallback, such as a plain blurred translucent panel, for cases where the effect fails.
- Check each project’s maintenance and API state before depending on it, since these are small, fast-moving projects.
- Measure frame rate in your own app instead of relying on README claims.
Do you need the shader book?
No. The shader textbook is optional reading if you want to write your own refraction shader and understand refract. Installing a React library requires none of it.
Quick Recap
Best Value
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Rank #4
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