How to Access Tailwind Colors from JavaScript ?
Last Updated :
23 Jul, 2025
Tailwind CSS is a "Utility first CSS framework". The feature that makes Tailwind has a variety of classes and provides a huge set of predefined colors that can be used in our stylesheets without the need to define them manually. These predefined colors are categorized into different color palettes which allows easy access to these colors and can be applied directly to our desired elements just by writing some predefined conventions without the need to define them manually. These colors can be referenced from CSS as well as JavaScript. In this article, we will see how to access the Tailwind colors from JavaScript. For this, we will install & create a basic Tailwind project, along with configuring the required files.
Create a new project:
To get started, we will follow the below step:
- Use the following commands in your terminal to create a new project directory and navigate into it:
mkdir file-name
cd file-name
- Next, initialize a new Node.js project using the following command:
npm init -y
Installing Tailwind CSS:
- After creating the new project, we need to install Tailwind CSS and create a configuration file tailwind.config.js. This can be done by running the following command in the terminal:
npm install -D tailwindcss
npx tailwindcss init
- Configure your template paths: Add the paths to all of your template files in your tailwind.config.js file by adding ["./public/**/*.{html, js}"] to content:
JavaScript
/** @type {import('tailwindcss').Config} */
module.exports = {
content: ["./public/**/*.{html,js}"],
theme: {
extend: {},
},
plugins: [],
}
- Create files for HTML & stylesheet: Create a new public directory in the root of our project directory. In the public directory create a new file tailwind.css. In tailwind.css add the @tailwind directives for each of Tailwind’s layers:
@tailwind base;
@tailwind components;
@tailwind utilities;
- Start the Tailwind CLI build process: Run the CLI tool to scan your template files for classes and build your CSS:
npx tailwindcss -i public/tailwind.css -o public/styles.css --watch
It will create an output css file styles.css in the public folder. Now we can start using Tailwind in our HTML and JavaScript files.
Project Structure:
Example 1: In this example, we add a tailwind using the CDN. Upon clicking the "Change Color" button, the background color of the main div will change from red to green.
HTML
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<meta name="viewport"
content="width=device-width,
initial-scale=1.0">
<script src=
"https://cdn.tailwindcss.com/3.4.16">
</script>
<script src="script.js"></script>
<title>
Access Tailwind Colors from JS with GFG
</title>
</head>
<body>
<div id="main"
class="bg-red-500 text-white p-4">
Hello and Welcome to GeeksforGeeks!
</div>
<button id="colorChange"
onclick="changeColor()">
Change Color
</button>
</body>
</html>
function changeColor() {
// Accessing the div
const element =
document.getElementById('main');
// Remove the current color class
element.classList.remove('bg-red-500');
// Add a new color class
element.classList.add('bg-green-500');
}
Output:
Example 2: Using the Tailwind CLI and configuring files for adding Tailwind in the project and accessing Tailwind Colors from JavaScript.
/** @type {import('tailwindcss').Config} */
module.exports = {
content: ["./src/**/*.{html,js}"],
theme: {
extend: {
colors: {
primary: '#ff0000',
secondary: '#00ff00',
tertiary: '#0000ff'
}
},
},
plugins: [],
}- In your project's CSS file, include the Tailwind CSS styles by using @import or @use statements.
@import 'tailwindcss/base';
@import 'tailwindcss/components';
@import 'tailwindcss/utilities';
- Steps to run: Run the build command to generate the CSS file with Tailwind styles:
npx tailwindcss -i ./src/styles.css -o ./dist/output.css --watch
- Add your compiled CSS file to the <head> and start using Tailwind’s utility classes to style your content.
<link href="/https/www.geeksforgeeks.org/dist/output.css" rel="stylesheet">
HTML
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<meta name="viewport"
content="width=device-width,
initial-scale=1.0">
<link href="../dist/output.css"
rel="stylesheet">
</head>
<body>
<h1 class="text-3xl font-bold underline
text-green-500">
GeeksforGeeks!
</h1>
<div id="colorBox"
class="color-box bg-primary">
ok
</div>
<script>
const colorBox =
document.getElementById('colorBox');
// Change the background color of the
// color box on click
colorBox.addEventListener('click', function () {
// Get the current color class
const currentColor = colorBox.classList[1];
// Get the next color class
const nextColor = getNextColor(currentColor);
colorBox.classList.remove(currentColor);
colorBox.classList.add(nextColor);
});
// Get the next color class based on
// the current color class
function getNextColor(currentColor) {
switch (currentColor) {
case 'bg-primary':
return 'bg-secondary';
case 'bg-secondary':
return 'bg-tertiary';
case 'bg-tertiary':
return 'bg-primary';
default:
return 'bg-primary';
}
}
</script>
</body>
</html>
@import 'tailwindcss/base';
@import 'tailwindcss/components';
@import 'tailwindcss/utilities';
.color-box {
width: 40px;
height: 30px;
border-radius: 8px;
cursor: pointer;
text-align: center;
}
Output:
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