Link Preview

Hover card preview.

Usage

The hover-card pattern: peek at what is behind a link without following it. Content portals to <body> automatically, so z-index stacking stays clean.

Know the limits

This card opens on pointer hover only. It does not open on focus, so keyboard users never see it, and there is no hover on touch, so mobile users never see it either.

That makes it enrichment, never a delivery mechanism. Everything inside the card must be reachable another way — put an action or a fact only in here and you have hidden it from a large share of your users. The upside is that the trigger stays a real <a href>, so the destination itself is always reachable.

If the content is essential, use a Popover — it opens on click, which works for every input method.

The trigger reports as a button

Worth knowing before you ship it: Bits renders the trigger as an anchor with your href, but overrides its role to button with aria-haspopup="dialog". A screen reader therefore announces "button", not "link", so the element does not advertise that it navigates.

The practical consequence: do not rely on the trigger alone to communicate a destination. Make the link text say where it goes, or provide the same navigation somewhere that is announced as a link.

Props

LinkPreview.Root

PropTypeDefault
children bits-ui Snippet<[]> | undefined
closeDelay bits-ui The delay in milliseconds before the preview closes.number | undefined300
disabled bits-ui When `true`, the preview will be disabled and will not open.boolean | undefinedfalse
ignoreNonKeyboardFocus bits-ui Prevent the preview from opening if the focus did not come using the keyboard.boolean | undefinedfalse
onOpenChange bits-ui A callback that will be called when the link preview is opened or closed.OnChangeFn<boolean> | undefined
onOpenChangeComplete bits-ui A callback that will be called when the link preview finishes opening/closing animations.OnChangeFn<boolean> | undefined
open bits-ui The open state of the link preview.boolean | undefinedfalse
openDelay bits-ui The delay in milliseconds before the preview opens.number | undefined700

LinkPreview.Trigger

PropTypeDefault
child bits-ui Snippet<[{ props: Record<string, unknown>; }]> | undefined
children bits-ui Snippet<[]> | undefined
href html string | null | undefined
id bits-ui string | undefined
ref bits-ui HTMLElement | null | undefined

LinkPreview.Content

PropTypeDefault
class Extra classes merged onto the floating card.string
align bits-ui The preferred alignment of the anchor to render against when open. This may change when collisions occur."start" | "center" | "end" | undefined
alignOffset bits-ui An offset in pixels from the "start" or "end" alignment options.number | undefined
arrowPadding bits-ui This describes the padding between the arrow and the edges of the floating element. If your floating element has border-radius, this will prevent it from overflowing the corners.number | undefined
avoidCollisions bits-ui When `true`, overrides the `side` and `align` options to prevent collisions with the boundary edges.boolean | undefinedtrue
child bits-ui Snippet<[FloatingContentSnippetProps & { props: Record<string, unknown>; }]> | undefined
children bits-ui Snippet<[]> | undefined
collisionBoundary bits-ui A boundary element or array of elements to check for collisions against.Arrayable<Boundary> | undefined
collisionPadding bits-ui The amount in pixels of virtual padding around the viewport edges to check for overflow which will cause a collision.number | Partial<Record<"top" | "right" | "bottom" | "left", number>> | undefined8
customAnchor bits-ui Use an element other than the trigger to anchor the content to. If provided, the content will be anchored to the provided element instead of the trigger. You can pass a selector string or an HTMLElement.string | HTMLElement | Measurable | null | undefined
dir bits-ui The text direction of the content.Direction | undefined
escapeKeydownBehavior bits-ui Escape behavior type. `close`: Closes the element immediately. `defer-otherwise-close`: Delegates the action to its parent component that has an escape keydown handler. If no parent is found, it closes the element. `defer-otherwise-ignore`: Delegates the action to the parent element. If no parent is found, nothing is done. `ignore`: Prevents the element from closing and also blocks the parent element from closing in response to an escape key press.EscapeBehaviorType | undefined`close`
forceMount bits-ui When `true`, the link preview content will be forced to mount in the DOM. Useful for more control over the transition behavior.boolean | undefined
hideWhenDetached bits-ui boolean | undefined
id bits-ui string | undefined
interactOutsideBehavior bits-ui Interact outside behavior type. `close`: Closes the element immediately. `defer-otherwise-close`: Delegates the action to the parent element. If no parent is found, it closes the element. `defer-otherwise-ignore`: Delegates the action to the parent element. If no parent is found, nothing is done. `ignore`: Prevents the element from closing and also blocks the parent element from closing in response to an outside interaction.InteractOutsideBehaviorType | undefined`close`
onEscapeKeydown bits-ui Callback fired when escape is pressed.((e: KeyboardEvent) => void) | undefined
onFocusOutside bits-ui Callback fired when focus leaves the dismissible layer.((event: FocusEvent) => void) | undefined
onInteractOutside bits-ui Callback fired when an outside interaction event completes, which is either a `pointerup`, `mouseup`, or `touchend` event, depending on the user's input device.InteractOutsideEventHandler | undefined
ref bits-ui HTMLElement | null | undefined
side bits-ui The preferred side of the anchor to render against when open. Will be reversed when collisions occur."top" | "right" | "bottom" | "left" | undefined
sideOffset bits-ui The distance in pixels from the anchor to the floating element.number | undefined
sticky bits-ui "partial" | "always" | undefined

Root, Trigger and Arrow are re-exported from Bits unchanged, so their props are forwarded rather than redeclared.

LinkPreview.Trigger — plus the native anchor attributes.

LinkPreview.Content — plus the Bits floating-position props (side, align, sideOffset).