MessageKit/MessageKit
MessageKit
MessageKit is an iOS chat UI framework that provides a scrollable conversation interface built on UICollectionView, enabling developers to render text, images, videos, locations, emoji, audio, and contact messages within message bubbles. The framework is designed around a pre-built MessagesViewController that can be subclassed to inherit the full chat layout, input bar, and message display without writing UI from scratch, and it uses a data source protocol for message retrieval along with delegate callbacks for user interactions.
The framework distinguishes itself through a highly customizable message cell system that divides each cell into seven configurable parts for fine-grained control over labels, avatars, and accessory views, alongside a customizable input bar with left and right button stacks that bind custom behaviors to touch, text change, and keyboard events. It supports embedding custom chat cells, hiding avatars per message, and automatically sizing custom cells, while also offering a SwiftUI embedding component for integrating the chat interface into modern iOS applications.
Additional capabilities include rendering media messages with dedicated bubble layouts, reacting to input bar events and send button presses, and attaching actions to toolbar buttons. The framework is distributed under the MIT license and can be embedded as a git submodule with Carthage support for dependency management.
Features
- iOS Chat UI Frameworks - Provides a scrollable conversation interface for rendering text, images, videos, and other message types in iOS apps.
- Chat Interface Components - Provides a pre-built scrollable conversation view that manages message layout and cell rendering from model objects.
- Data Source Protocols - Defines a data source protocol for supplying message objects and handling cell selection.
- Message Composition Inputs - Provides a text input bar with a send button that triggers a delegate callback when the user submits a message.
- Message - Retrieves and manages message data through a data source protocol with delegate callbacks.
- Pre-built View Controllers - Provides a pre-built view controller that developers subclass to inherit chat layout and message display.
- Photo Message Renderers - Displays photo images within a conversation bubble using a media item.
- Text Message Renderers - Displays plain text messages in a conversation bubble using a configurable font.
- Chat Input Composers - Ships a customizable input accessory view with a text field and button stacks for message composition.
- Chat Message List Renderers - Renders a scrollable conversation interface that displays message bubbles for text, images, videos, and other media types.
- Bubble Layout Systems - Displays text, images, videos, locations, emoji, audio, and contact messages with dedicated bubble layouts.
- Dynamic Bubble Layouts - Adjusts the size, appearance, and padding of each label and container within a message cell.
- Custom Message Cells - Ships a custom cell registration system for rendering arbitrary message types in a chat list.
- Collection View Layouts - Renders chat messages as cells in a collection view for flexible scrolling and animations.
- Seven-Part Cell Layouts - Divides each message cell into seven configurable parts for fine-grained layout control of labels, avatars, and accessory views.
- Callback Delegates - Uses delegate callbacks to notify the host about cell taps and send button presses.
- Multi-Type Message Renderers - Automatically selects the correct cell for text, photo, video, location, emoji, audio, contact, or link preview content.
- Attributed Text Renderers - Renders text messages with custom attributes like colors and fonts in conversation bubbles.
- Bubble Text Renderers - Displays text messages with custom attributes like colors and fonts in a conversation bubble.
- Bubble Text Renderers - Renders plain and attributed text messages inside customizable chat bubbles.
- Contact Message Renderers - Displays contact information within a conversation bubble using a contact item.
- Audio Message Renderers - Displays audio messages with playback controls within the conversation interface.
- Video Message Renderers - Displays video content within a conversation bubble using a media item.
- Embedding Components - Embeds a chat interface inside a SwiftUI view hierarchy for interactive messaging in modern iOS apps.
- Location Message Renderers - Displays a location map or coordinates within a conversation bubble using a location item.
- Avatar Visibility Controls - Shows or hides avatar views per message and optionally removes the space they occupy in the cell layout.
- Input Bar - Places custom buttons on either side of the text view and hooks their behavior to touch, text changes, or keyboard events.
- Input Bar Action Attachments - Attaches custom closures to button taps, text changes, and keyboard events on the input bar.
- Emoji Message Renderers - Provides dedicated rendering for emoji-only messages with configurable font sizing.
- Input Bar Event Handlers - Triggers custom actions on button taps, text changes, keyboard events, and selection state changes.
- Message Delegate Callbacks - Uses the collection view's index path and data source to access the underlying message model from a cell delegate callback.
- SwiftUI Chat Embeddings - Provides a SwiftUI component for embedding the chat interface into modern iOS applications.
- Button Stack Configurations - Provides a text input bar with configurable left and right button stacks for custom toolbar actions.
- Input Bar Layout Customizers - Adjusts padding and stack widths to control the arrangement of the text view and button groups.
- Stack Width Adjustments - Adjusts padding and width of button stacks so the text input area fills the available space.
- Location Message Renderers - Renders location previews with map pins inside chat message bubbles.
- Message Display Modifications - Adjusts the visual appearance of message bubbles through a display delegate protocol.
- Photo Message Renderers - Renders photo attachments inside chat message bubbles.
- Video Message Renderers - Renders video attachments inside chat message bubbles.
- Custom Cell Size Calculators - Calculates the dimensions of a custom message cell by subclassing a size calculator.
- Delegate-Based Configurations - Adjusts the visual layout and display attributes of messages through delegate protocols with default implementations.
- Link Preview Services - Displays a rich preview of a URL with title, description, and image inside a chat bubble.
- Messaging Components - Community-driven replacement for standard message controllers.
- Chat Interfaces - Community-driven replacement for messaging interfaces.
- Messaging UI - Swift-based messaging UI library.
