Importing CSS files in Isomorphic React Components

Question

I have a React application with Components written in ES6 - transpiled via Babel and Webpack.

In some places I would like to include specific CSS files with specific

Answer 1

You probably have an error in your Webpack config where you're using the babel-loader for all files, and not just .js files. You want to use a css loader for .css files.

But you shouldn't use import for loading any other module than Javascript modules, because once imports are implemented in browsers, you will only be able to import Javascript files. Use require instead in cases where you need Webpack specific functionality.

ORIGINAL POST

Webpack uses require and Babel lets you use import from ES6 which mostly do the same thing (and Babel transpiles the import to a require statement), but they are not interchangable. Webpacks require function lets you specify more than just a module name, it lets you specify loaders as well, which you cannot do with ES6 imports. So if you want to load a CSS file, you should use require instead of import.

The reason is that Babel is just a transpiler for what's coming in ES6, and ES6 will not allow you to import CSS files. So Babel won't allow you to do that either.