Nested layouts

Layouts provide nested UI and request handling (middleware) to a set of routes:

• Shared request handling: Accomplished by adding an onRequest method.
• Shared UI: Accomplished by export default a Qwik component.

Example

Let's put together all the concepts we have learned so far to build a full app.

In the proposed example, we have a site with 2 pages: https://example.com and https://example.com/about, and we want to add a common header and footer to all the pages, the only difference between the pages is the content in the middle.

┌───────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ Header                                            │
├─────────┬─────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ Menu    │ <ROUTE_SPECIFIC_CONTENT>                │
│ - home  │                                         │
│ - about │                                         │
│         │                                         │
├─────────┴─────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ Footer                                            │
└───────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

First, we create three components: <Header>, <Footer>, and <Menu>.

The developer could copy-paste these components manually into each page component, but that is repetitive and error-prone, instead, we can use layouts to automatically reuse common parts.

Routes directory

src/
├── components/
│   ├── header.tsx         # Header component implementation
│   ├── footer.tsx         # Footer component implementation
│   └── menu.tsx           # Menu component implementation
└── routes/
    ├── layout.tsx         # Layout implementation using: <Header>, <Footer>, and <Menu>
    ├── about/
    │   └── index.tsx      # https://example.com/about
    └── index.tsx          # https://example.com

src/routes/layout.tsx

It will be used for all routes under the src/routes directory. It will render the Header, Menu, and Footer components, and also render the nested routes under the Slot component.

import { component$ } from '@builder.io/qwik';
 
export default component$(() => {
  return (
    <>
      <Header />
      <Menu />
      <Slot /> {/* <== This is where the route will be inserted */}
      <Footer />
    </>
  );
});

src/routes/index.tsx

This is the main route for the site. It will be rendered under the Slot component in the src/routes/layout.tsx file, so even though it doesn't have any of the Header, Menu, or Footer components, it will still be rendered with them.

import { component$ } from '@builder.io/qwik';
 
export default component$(() => {
  return <>Home</>;
});

src/routes/about/index.tsx

Same as the src/routes/index.tsx file, but for the about route, similary it will be rendered under the Slot component in the src/routes/layout.tsx file, so even though it doesn't have any of the Header, Menu, or Footer components, it will still be rendered with them.

import { component$ } from '@builder.io/qwik';
 
export default component$(() => {
  return <>About</>;
});

When we run the app, Qwik will render the About nested inside the RootLayout

<RootLayout>
  <AboutPage />
</RootLayout>