AngularUI Router

The de-facto solution to flexible routing with nested views

AngularUI Router is a routing framework for AngularJS, which allows you to organize the parts of your interface into a state machine. Unlike the $route service in the Angular ngRoute module, which is organized around URL routes, UI-Router is organized around states, which may optionally have routes, as well as other behavior, attached.

States are bound to named, nested and parallel views, allowing you to powerfully manage your application's interface.

Check out the sample app: http://angular-ui.github.io/ui-router/sample/

Note: UI-Router is under active development. As such, while this library is well-tested, the API may change. Consider using it in production applications only if you're comfortable following a changelog and updating your usage accordingly.

Get Started

(1) Get UI-Router in one of 4 ways:

clone & build this repository
download the release (or minified)
via Bower: by running $ bower install angular-ui-router from your console
or via npm: by running $ npm install angular-ui-router from your console
or via Component: by running $ component install angular-ui/ui-router from your console

(2) Include angular-ui-router.js (or angular-ui-router.min.js) in your index.html, after including Angular itself (For Component users: ignore this step)

(3) Add 'ui.router' to your main module's list of dependencies (For Component users: replace 'ui.router' with require('angular-ui-router'))

When you're done, your setup should look similar to the following:

<!doctype html>
<html ng-app="myApp">
<head>
    <script src="//ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/angularjs/1.1.5/angular.min.js"></script>
    <script src="js/angular-ui-router.min.js"></script>
    <script>
        var myApp = angular.module('myApp', ['ui.router']);
        // For Component users, it should look like this:
        // var myApp = angular.module('myApp', [require('angular-ui-router')]);
    </script>
    ...
</head>
<body>
    ...
</body>
</html>

Nested States & Views

The majority of UI-Router's power is in its ability to nest states & views.

(1) First, follow the setup instructions detailed above.

(2) Then, add a ui-view directive to the <body /> of your app.

<!-- index.html -->
<body>
    <div ui-view></div>
    <!-- We'll also add some navigation: -->
    <a ui-sref="state1">State 1</a>
    <a ui-sref="state2">State 2</a>
</body>

(3) You'll notice we also added some links with ui-sref directives. In addition to managing state transitions, this directive auto-generates the href attribute of the <a /> element it's attached to, if the corresponding state has a URL. Next we'll add some templates. These will plug into the ui-view within index.html. Notice that they have their own ui-view as well! That is the key to nesting states and views.

<!-- partials/state1.html -->
<h1>State 1</h1>
<hr/>
<a ui-sref="state1.list">Show List</a>
<div ui-view></div>

<!-- partials/state2.html -->
<h1>State 2</h1>
<hr/>
<a ui-sref="state2.list">Show List</a>
<div ui-view></div>

(4) Next, we'll add some child templates. These will get plugged into the ui-view of their parent state templates.

<!-- partials/state1.list.html -->
<h3>List of State 1 Items</h3>
<ul>
  <li ng-repeat="item in items">{{ item }}</li>
</ul>

<!-- partials/state2.list.html -->
<h3>List of State 2 Things</h3>
<ul>
  <li ng-repeat="thing in things">{{ thing }}</li>
</ul>

(5) Finally, we'll wire it all up with $stateProvider. Set up your states in the module config, as in the following:

myApp.config(function($stateProvider, $urlRouterProvider) {
  //
  // For any unmatched url, redirect to /state1
  $urlRouterProvider.otherwise("/state1");
  //
  // Now set up the states
  $stateProvider
    .state('state1', {
      url: "/state1",
      templateUrl: "partials/state1.html"
    })
    .state('state1.list', {
      url: "/list",
      templateUrl: "partials/state1.list.html",
      controller: function($scope) {
        $scope.items = ["A", "List", "Of", "Items"];
      }
    })
    .state('state2', {
      url: "/state2",
      templateUrl: "partials/state2.html"
    })
    .state('state2.list', {
      url: "/list",
      templateUrl: "partials/state2.list.html",
      controller: function($scope) {
        $scope.things = ["A", "Set", "Of", "Things"];
      }
    });
});

(6) See this quick start example in action.

Go to Quick Start Plunker for Nested States & Views

(7) This only scratches the surface

Dive Deeper!

Multiple & Named Views

Another great feature is the ability to have multiple ui-views view per template.

Pro Tip: While multiple parallel views are a powerful feature, you'll often be able to manage your interfaces more effectively by nesting your views, and pairing those views with nested states.

(1) Follow the setup instructions detailed above.

(2) Add one or more ui-view to your app, give them names.

<!-- index.html -->
<body>
    <div ui-view="viewA"></div>
    <div ui-view="viewB"></div>
    <!-- Also a way to navigate -->
    <a ui-sref="route1">Route 1</a>
    <a ui-sref="route2">Route 2</a>
</body>

(3) Set up your states in the module config:

myApp.config(function($stateProvider) {
  $stateProvider
    .state('index', {
      url: "",
      views: {
        "viewA": { template: "index.viewA" },
        "viewB": { template: "index.viewB" }
      }
    })
    .state('route1', {
      url: "/route1",
      views: {
        "viewA": { template: "route1.viewA" },
        "viewB": { template: "route1.viewB" }
      }
    })
    .state('route2', {
      url: "/route2",
      views: {
        "viewA": { template: "route2.viewA" },
        "viewB": { template: "route2.viewB" }
      }
    })
});

(4) See this quick start example in action.

Go to Quick Start Plunker for Multiple & Named Views

Resources

In-Depth Guide
API Reference
Sample App (Source)
FAQ
Slides comparing ngRoute to ui-router
UI-Router Extras / Addons (@christopherthielen)

Videos

Introduction Video (egghead.io)
Tim Kindberg on Angular UI-Router
Activating States (egghead.io)
Learn Angular.js using UI-Router (LearnCode.academy)

Reporting issues and Contributing

Please read our Contributor guidelines before reporting an issue or creating a pull request.

mattphoto/ui-router