How to change MUI X Data Grid cell orientation to be row-level instead of column-level?

Question

I am working on implementing the MUI X Data Grid component for my table-based UI. However, I have a specific requirement where I need the table cells to be associated with the row level, rather than the traditional column-level association.

By default, the MUI X Data Grid operates in a column-based manner, where each cell belongs to a specific column. However, in my case, I want to customize the behavior so that each cell corresponds to a row instead. This means that I want to render custom cell components for each row, and these components should be aware of the corresponding row data.

I've tried exploring the official documentation and searching for examples, but I haven't found any built-in options or configurations that directly address this specific requirement.

Can anyone guide me on how to achieve this row-level cell association with the MUI X Data Grid? Are there any available props, hooks, or methods that can be utilized for this purpose? If not, what would be the best approach to customize the table cell behavior to achieve this?

Answer 1

By customizing cell rendering, you can achieve this row-level cell association with the MUI X Data Grid. This allows you to define a custom component that will be rendered for each cell in the grid.

To do this, you need to pass some additional data to each row, such as the type and color of the cell component. For example, you can have different types of cell components, such as button, input, select, or text. You can also have different colors for each cell component, such as primary, secondary, or default.

Then, you need to create a custom cell component that will render different elements based on the type and color of the row data. For example, you can use MUI components such as Button, TextField, Select, or Typography. You can also use props such as value and field to access the cell value and field name.

Finally, you need to pass your custom cell component to the renderCell prop of each column in the grid. This will override the default rendering of the cells and use your custom component instead.

For example:

const CustomCell = ({ row: { type, color }, value, field, ...rest }) => {
  if (field === "id") {
    return <Typography justifyContent="center">{value}</Typography>;
  } else if (type === "button") {
    return (
      <Button fullWidth variant="contained" color={color}>
        {value}
      </Button>
    );
  } else if (type === "input") {
    return (
      <TextField fullWidth color={color} size="small" defaultValue={value} />
    );
  } else if (type === "select") {
    return (
      <Select fullWidth color={color} size="small" defaultValue={value}>
        <MenuItem value=""></MenuItem>
        <MenuItem value={0}>0</MenuItem>
        <MenuItem value={1}>1</MenuItem>
        <MenuItem value={2}>2</MenuItem>
      </Select>
    );
  } else {
    return <Typography color={color}>{value}</Typography>;
  }
};

const rows = [
  {
    id: 1,
    type: "button",
    color: "primary",
    firstName: "a",
    lastName: "a",
    gender: "a"
  },
  {
    id: 2,
    type: "input",
    color: "primary",
    firstName: "a",
    lastName: "a",
    gender: "a"
  }
]

return (
  <DataGrid
    rows={rows}
    columns={columns.map((column) => ({
      ...column,
      renderCell: (props) => <CustomCell {...props} />
    }))}
  />
);

You can see the whole example here: codesandbox.io