LazyLoad media elements with react-lazy-props and IntersectionObserver

Serg
2 min readDec 1, 2019
Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash

LazyLoad media elements with react-lazy-props and IntersectionObserver

GitHub: https://github.com/lionix-team/react-lazy-props

NPM: https://www.npmjs.com/package/react-lazy-props

Installation

npm i react-lazy-props

Usage

Wrap the elements you want to lazyload with LazyProps component
It will unload media before components were mounted and will load them only when they are observed.

Example:

import LazyProps from "react-lazy-props";
...
return (
<LazyProps>
<div>
<h2 style={{backgroundImage: `url("${backgroundImage}")`}}>Title</h2>
<p>Some Images</p>
<img src="example.jpg" srcSet={"example2x.jpg 2x", "example3x.jpg 3x"} />
<video src="https://www.example.com/video.ogg" />
</div>
</LazyProps>
);

Unloading process:

LazyProps renders its child components with props and styles replaced according to the map:

  • src to data-src
  • srcSet to data-srcset
  • backgroundImage to data-bg-src

HTML Output (Unloaded):

<div>
<h2 data-bg-src="url('background-image.png')">Title</h2>
<p>Some Images</p>
<img data-src="example.jpg" data-srcset="example2x.jpg 2x, example3x.jpg 3x" />
<video data-src="https://www.example.com/video.ogg" />
</div>

Loading process:

LazyProps component observes NodeList with Unloaded Prop Keys using IntersectionObserverAPI.
As soon as at least 1/10 of Node element is intersected, element props will gain their initial key.

HTML Output (Loaded):

<div>
<h2 style="background-image: url('background-image.png')">Title</h2>
<p>Some Images</p>
<img src="example.jpg" srcset="example2x.jpg 2x, example3x.jpg 3x" />
<video src="https://www.example.com/video.ogg" />
</div>

Component Props

children (undefined)

NOTE! Always wrap child components as LazyProps component returns its children unwrapped.

onElementLoad (function)

Arguments:

  • element - Node Object

The function will be invoked when one of the child elements is intersected.

import LazyProps from "react-lazy-props";
...
doSomething(element){
element.classList.add("intersected");
}
}
...
render {
return (
<LazyProps onElementLoad={element => this.doSomething(element)}>
...

onUnloadProps (function)

Arguments:

  • props - Object
  • componentType - String

The function will be invoked after component props were unloaded, this way you will be able to customize unloaded props of the element, for example, set up a placeholder src to images:

import LazyProps from "react-lazy-props";
...
setPlaceholder(props, componentType){
if(componentType === "img"){
props.src = this.state.placeholder;
}
}
return props;
}
...
render {
return (
<LazyProps onUnloadProps={(props, componentType)=> this.setPlaceholder(props, componentType)}>
...

NOTE! The function must always return the props object.

unloaded (boolean)

Default: false

If set to true elements won't be unloaded, but the observer still will be there, this approach will be more efficient because we will not have to loop through child elements and components unloading their props.
The difference is that you will have to set lazy props yourself:

import LazyProps from "react-lazy-props";
...
return (
<LazyProps unloaded={true}>
<div>
<h2 data-bg-src={backgroundImage}>Title</h2>
<p>Some Images</p>
<img data-src="example.jpg" />
<video data-src="https://www.example.com/video.ogg" />
</div>
</LazyProps>
);

IntersectionObserver polyfill

Since this package is observing elements with IntersectionObserver, you may want old browsers to support it with IntersectionObserver polyfill

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Serg

Indie Maker. Building useful SaaS applications with larafast.com. 🚀