Thoughts About a Table Paginator in React Aria 🪶

[itay-perry]

Hi,
I was just thinking it'll be very cool if React Aria Table could also have a paginator ✨
I don't know if it's a priority, but replacing MUI in my company's code with React Aria is a long lasting dream, and I just really hope it could happen someday.

[snowystinger]

Thanks for the discussion. I'm curious what you would expect to see. It should be possible to build this from RAC already, it'd just be some links/buttons to go to a certain page which would just replace the items being passed to the RAC Table.

We did have an API spec at one point for a Spectrum Pagination component, https://github.com/adobe/react-spectrum/blob/main/specs/api/Pagination.md though it wasn't ever prioritised due to virtualizer meaning that we could display infinite data in a table with progressive loading.

If you wanted, you could try building it in codesandbox or stackblitz and share your findings here, maybe we'd have some feedback or could use it to help plan something built-in if we decided to go that route.

[jure123]

@snowystinger, in our project we have accessibility requirements to use table pagination. According to my research infinite virtual tables are not against WCAG rules if done properly (I'm sure yours is compliant), but they are not the most user friendly in many cases (for disabled and non-disabled users).

Arguments for table paging (accessibility + usability):

- Clear “start/end” and predictable progress:
Pagination creates discrete pages with a known end, which makes it easier for screen reader and keyboard users to understand where they are and how far they’ve gone (and that they can finish). Infinite scroll often removes the concept of “end” unless you add extra controls and announcements.

- Better “back button” and return-to-position behavior:
With pagination, each page is naturally represented by URL/state (e.g., ?page=3), so returning via browser back usually lands you where you expect. Infinite scroll commonly breaks history navigation and scroll restoration unless you implement custom state restoration; browsers can restore scroll, but SPAs and dynamic loading often interfere.

- Supported by established government design guidance:
GOV.UK provides a dedicated pagination component specifically to help users move forward/back through results split into pages—this is the “boring and reliable” pattern public-sector accessibility teams expect. US gov recommends it as well

[snowystinger]

Thanks, I wasn't disagreeing that it could be a better UX in some cases. What I meant was, what would you expect to see in terms of how the component would let you do this? What API? Did you try building it with RAC already? Where did it fall short?