A 1:1 port of TailwindCSS 4.x to PHP — generate Tailwind utility CSS with no Node.js and no build step.

TailwindPHP is a 1:1 port of TailwindCSS 4.x to PHP. It scans your markup for class names and generates the exact same utility CSS that TailwindCSS produces — entirely in PHP, with no Node.js, no build step, and no extensions beyond a standard PHP 8.2+ build.

The problem: TailwindCSS is written in TypeScript and runs on Node.js. Any PHP project that wants Tailwind inherits a second runtime, an npm install, and a build step in CI and Docker. For WordPress plugins, framework packages, and apps that generate CSS at runtime, that's friction — or a dealbreaker.

TailwindPHP solves this by implementing the Tailwind compiler natively in PHP:

• The complete TailwindCSS v4.3 surface — all 364 utilities, every variant (hover, focus, responsive, dark mode, container queries, arbitrary values), and byte-for-byte output
• The full directive set — @import, @theme, @apply, @utility, @custom-variant, @layer, @plugin, and @source
• Tailwind's CSS functions — theme(), --theme(), --spacing(), --alpha() — plus color-mix() → oklab() and the transforms Tailwind delegates to LightningCSS
• Batteries included — PHP ports of clsx, tailwind-merge, and CVA as cn(), merge(), join(), and variants()
• Plugins — @tailwindcss/typography and @tailwindcss/forms ported in full, plus a PHP plugin API for your own
• A CLI (bin/tailwindphp) that mirrors @tailwindcss/cli, plus file-based caching and a CSS minifier
• 4,000+ tests — output is verified against TailwindCSS's own test suites, extracted from the TypeScript source and re-run on every push

composer require tailwindphp/tailwindphp

use TailwindPHP\tw;

// Generate CSS from markup — only the classes you actually use
$css = tw::generate('<div class="flex items-center gap-4 p-6 bg-blue-500">');

// Customize the theme with a CSS string
$css = tw::generate(
    '<div class="bg-brand p-4">',
    '@import "tailwindcss"; @theme { --color-brand: #3b82f6; }'
);

// Inspect a class without rendering a full stylesheet
tw::computedProperties('p-4');      // ['padding' => '1rem']
tw::computedValue('text-blue-500'); // 'oklch(.546 .245 262.881)'

Build conditional class strings and resolve conflicts (clsx + tailwind-merge):

use function TailwindPHP\cn;

cn('px-2 py-1', 'px-4');             // 'py-1 px-4'
cn('btn', ['btn-primary' => true]);  // 'btn btn-primary'

Declarative component variants (CVA):

use function TailwindPHP\variants;

$button = variants([
    'base' => 'inline-flex items-center rounded-md font-medium',
    'variants' => [
        'intent' => ['primary' => 'bg-blue-500 text-white', 'ghost' => 'hover:bg-accent'],
        'size'   => ['sm' => 'h-9 px-3', 'lg' => 'h-11 px-8'],
    ],
    'defaultVariants' => ['intent' => 'primary', 'size' => 'sm'],
]);

$button(['size' => 'lg']); // 'inline-flex … bg-blue-500 text-white h-11 px-8'

A drop-in port of @tailwindcss/cli — same options, no Node.js:

# Build CSS from an input file
./vendor/bin/tailwindphp -i ./src/app.css -o ./dist/styles.css

# Watch and rebuild on change
./vendor/bin/tailwindphp -i ./src/app.css -o ./dist/styles.css --watch

# Minify for production
./vendor/bin/tailwindphp -i ./src/app.css -o ./dist/styles.css --minify

Point @source at the templates to scan in your input CSS:

@import "tailwindcss";
@source "./templates";

Full documentation lives at tailwindphp.com (or in docs/ if you're reading the repo).

• Getting Started — install and generate your first stylesheet
• Usage — content scanning, theme, directives, imports, and @source
• Class Utilities — cn(), merge(), join(), and variants()
• Plugins — typography, forms, and writing your own
• API — the full tw surface and the TailwindCompiler instance
• CLI — bin/tailwindphp reference
• Advanced — architecture, caching, and performance

TailwindPHP ports:

• TailwindCSS by Tailwind Labs
• clsx by Luke Edwards
• tailwind-merge by Dany Castillo
• CVA by Joe Bell

MIT