A widget toolkit, widget library, GUI toolkit, or UX library is a library or a collection of libraries containing a set of graphical control elements (called widgets) used to construct the graphical user interface (GUI) of programs.
- Qt (pronounced "Cute")
- Used by KDE Plasma, LXQt, Deepin, and many other DEs
- Written in C++
- Backwards compatibility
- Is open source, but has corporate limitations
- GTK (GIMP ToolKit)
- Formerly called GTK+ or GIMP
- Written in C
- Used by Gnome, Cinnamon, MATE, Xfce, LXDE, Unity, and many other DEs
- Many have called this toolkit inefficient and bloated, based on C
- Lacks backwards compatibility with each new release
- EFL (Enlightenment Foundation Libraries)
- Skia
- Android
- Cocoa
- Apple MacOS
- Windows API
- Clutter
- Discontinued?