Using v0 with React Native: What Works & What Breaks

Can you use Vercel’s AI-powered v0 to build React Native apps? This 2025 guide dives deep into what’s possible, what breaks, and how to adapt v0-generated components for native mobile development. You’ll get clear comparisons, community insights, and best practices to help you navigate the gap between web and mobile UI.

1. Component Portability from Web to Mobile

Vercel’s v0 is built for web-first UI generation. It outputs HTML tags, Tailwind CSS, and Next.js-flavored React. But React Native uses entirely different building blocks: <View>, <Text>, and <Image> instead of <div>, <p>, and <img>.

What breaks:

• HTML tags like <button> and <a> don’t exist in React Native
• DOM APIs like window, document, or browser events are unsupported
• Layout models differ: web uses CSS box model, React Native uses Flexbox

What works (with adaptation):

• Component logic (JS functions, props, state) is portable
• JSX structure can be reused if you swap out the HTML tags

2. Navigation Differences: Next.js vs React Navigation

v0 generates components using Next.js conventions like <Link href="/about">. React Native apps rely on libraries like React Navigation with imperative routing (navigation.navigate('About')).

Web navigation won’t work natively:

• No <Link> support — needs conversion
• No pages/ routing — needs Stack, Tab, or Drawer navigators
• No deep linking out of the box

How to adapt:

Wrap v0 links with custom components that call navigation.navigate() using React Navigation’s context.

3. Styling: Tailwind CSS vs React Native Styles

v0 defaults to Tailwind CSS. React Native doesn’t support CSS — it uses StyleSheet.create() or JavaScript style objects. Fortunately, NativeWind brings Tailwind utility classes to native code.

What you can do:

• Use className on native components with NativeWind
• Retain much of v0’s styling intent

Limitations:

• NativeWind supports most, but not all, Tailwind utilities
• Gradients, media queries, pseudo-classes may not translate
• Layout behavior differs on small screens or flex containers

Recommended workflow:

Use NativeWind for 80%, fill gaps with native StyleSheet.

4. Developer Experiences: Real-World Friction in 2025

v0’s focus is web — and that’s reflected in what the community says:

• No RN support in the v0 UI or docs
• Devs report poor portability into mobile apps
• Styling, component mismatch, and link handling all require workarounds
• No working examples of full RN apps built with v0 as of 2025

Common complaints:

• Disappearing environment variables
• Incomplete styling previews
• Long unoptimized code that’s hard to clean up

5. Official Support: Where Vercel Draws the Line

As of 2025, Vercel does not support React Native in v0.

• Docs reference only Next.js and web frameworks
• Community managers confirm there’s no RN roadmap
• Vercel suggests using WebViews if needed (not ideal for native UX)

6. Smarter Alternatives for Native UI in 2025

Don’t force v0 into a role it wasn’t built for. Instead:

Use native-first UI libraries:

• Gluestack UI (NativeBase) — Tailwind-like props, well documented
• React Native Paper — Material Design-ready
• UI Kitten — Customizable and stable

Tailwind-style with NativeWind:

• Apply utility classes to native code
• Works across iOS and Android

For shared codebases:

• Solito — combine React Native and Next.js with unified routing
• react-native-web — bring RN components to the browser (not v0 → RN)

FAQ

Up Next: Managing Environment Variables in v0 Projects →
Explore: Creating a REST API for v0 with Next.js →