Using create-tauri-app

create-tauri-app is the official scaffolding tool for Tauri 2. It generates a complete project with a Rust backend and a frontend configured to use your chosen framework. The tool asks a few questions and produces a folder you can open, install, and run.

You should complete the System Dependencies Overview for Tauri 2 before running this tool. The scaffolding process will detect any missing system dependencies and tell you how to install them, but having Rust and Node.js (or another supported runtime) ready first prevents unnecessary errors.

Supported Frontend Templates

create-tauri-app ships with officially maintained templates for three frontend language ecosystems (for a full list of UI frameworks and flavors, see Supported Frontend Templates). The tool asks you to pick a language first, then shows the frameworks available for that ecosystem.

Rust frontend templates are compiled to WebAssembly with Trunk. Vanilla in this context is a minimal HTML/CSS/JS setup managed through Cargo, while Yew, Leptos, and Sycamore are Rust web frameworks. The .NET option uses Blazor, which also compiles to WebAssembly.

Running create-tauri-app

You start create-tauri-app with a single command (explore interactive vs non-interactive CLI flags in Running create-tauri-app). Choose the method that matches your shell or package manager.

npm create tauri-app@latest

Interactive Scaffolding

After you execute the command, the tool walks through a series of prompts. Here is a typical session:

? Project name (tauri-app) › my-app
? Identifier (com.my-app.app) ›
? Choose which language to use for your frontend ›
  Rust (cargo)
❯ TypeScript / JavaScript (pnpm, yarn, npm, bun)
  .NET (dotnet)
? Choose your package manager ›
  pnpm
❯ npm
  yarn
  bun
? Choose your UI template ›
  Vanilla
  Vue
  Svelte
❯ React
  Solid
  Angular
  Preact
? Choose your UI flavor ›
❯ TypeScript
  JavaScript

The project name becomes the folder name and the default window title. The identifier is a reverse‑domain string (like com.mycompany.myapp) that uniquely identifies your application on the system — the default is usually fine for development.

After you select the language, package manager, and template, create-tauri-app generates the project and prints the next commands you need to run.

Non‑Interactive Scaffolding

You can skip the prompts by passing the project name and desired template directly on the command line. This is useful in scripts or CI pipelines.

# npm (v7 and later needs an extra double dash)
npm create tauri-app@latest my-app -- --template react-ts
# Bash (curl)
sh <(curl https://create.tauri.app/sh) my-app --template react-ts
# PowerShell
$env:CTA_ARGS="--template react-ts"; irm https://create.tauri.app/ps | iex
# Cargo
cargo create-tauri-app my-app --template react-ts

Supported template shortcuts mirror the interactive choices: vanilla, vanilla-ts, vue, vue-ts, svelte, svelte-ts, react, react-ts, preact, preact-ts, solid, solid-ts, angular, yew, leptos, sycamore, blazor. The package manager is inferred from the command you used to invoke the tool.

Starting the Development Server

Once the project is generated, open the folder, install dependencies, and launch the Tauri development server. The generated output prints the exact commands, but the pattern is always the same.

cd my-app
npm install
npm run tauri dev

A native window opens with your frontend content. The development server supports hot‑reload: changes to your frontend code appear immediately, and changes to Rust code trigger an automatic recompile and restart.

create-tauri-app may report missing system packages after generating the project. It prints the exact terminal commands for your platform. Install those dependencies and rerun tauri dev.

Manual Setup Using the Tauri CLI

If you already have an existing frontend or you want full control over the project structure, you can add Tauri to your project manually (read step-by-step instructions in Manual Setup Using the Tauri CLI). This path uses the Tauri CLI to initialize the Rust backend next to your frontend code.

The steps below use Vite as an example frontend, but any tool that serves an HTTP development server works — Create React App, Next.js, Nuxt, SvelteKit, or even a bare HTML file served with npx serve.

mkdir my-app
cd my-app
npm create vite@latest .

npm install -D @tauri-apps/cli@latest

npx tauri init

✔ What is your app name? · my-app
✔ What should the window title be? · my-app
✔ Where are your web assets located? · ../dist
✔ What is the URL of your dev server? · http://localhost:5173
✔ What is your frontend dev command? · npm run dev
✔ What is your frontend build command? · npm run build

import { defineConfig } from "vite";
export default defineConfig({
  server: {
    watch: {
      ignored: ["**/src-tauri/**"],
    },
  },
});

npx tauri dev