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{{Short description|Software development tool}}
{{refimprove|date=November 2025}}
[[File:Gui-builder.png|thumb|[[NetBeans]] GUI builder]]
A '''graphical user interface builder''' (or '''GUI builder'''), also known as '''GUI designer''' or sometimes [[Rapid application development|RAD]] [[Integrated development environment|IDE]], is a [[software development tool]] that simplifies the creation of [[graphical user interface|GUIs]] by allowing the designer to arrange [[graphical control element]]s (often called widgets) using a [[drag-and-drop]] [[WYSIWYG]] editor.<ref>{{Cite conference | author = Zarras, Apostolos V.; Mamalis, Georgios; Papamichail, Aggelos; Kollias, Panagiotis; Vassiliadis, Panos | title = And the Tool Created a GUI That was Impure and Without Form: Anti-Patterns in Automatically Generated GUIs | year = 2018 | book-title = Proceedings of the 23rd European Conference on Pattern Languages of Programs (EuroPLoP '18) | location = Irsee, Germany | publisher = ACM | doi = 10.1145/3273418.3273450 | url = https://www.cse.uoi.gr/~pvassil/publications/2018_EuroPlop/Europlop_2018.pdf}}</ref> Without a GUI builder, a GUI must be built by manually specifying each widget's parameters in the source code, with no visual feedback until the program is run.

User interfaces are commonly programmed using an [[Event-driven programming|event-driven architecture]], so GUI builders also simplify creating event-driven code. This supporting code connects [[software widget]]s with the outgoing and incoming [[Event (computing)|events]] that trigger the functions providing the application logic.

Some graphical user interface builders automatically generate all the [[source code]] for a [[graphical control element]]. Others, like [[Interface Builder]] or [[Glade Interface Designer]], generate [[serialization|serialized]] object instances that are then loaded by the application.

==List of GUI builders==

===C language based===
* [[GTK]] / [[Glade Interface Designer]]
* [[Motif (software)|Motif]]
* [[XForms (toolkit)]] fdesign
* [[X Toolkit Intrinsics|Intrinsics]]

===C# based===
* [[Universal Windows Platform|UWP]] / [[Windows Presentation Foundation]] / [[WinForms]]
** Microsoft [[Visual Studio | Visual Studio XAML Editor]], [[XAML]] based GUI layout
** Microsoft [[Expression Blend]]
** [[SharpDevelop]]
* [[Xamarin.Forms]] / [[.NET Core]]
** [[Xamarin | Xamarin Studio]]

===C++ based===
* [[Universal Windows Platform|UWP]] / [[Windows Presentation Foundation]] / [[WinForms]]
** Microsoft [[Visual Studio | Visual Studio XAML Editor]], [[XAML]] based GUI layout
** [[Microsoft Blend]]
* [[Qt (toolkit)]]
** [[Qt Creator]]
* [[FLTK]]
** [[FLUID]]
* [[JUCE]]
* [[Ultimate++|U++]]
* [[wxWidgets]]
** [[wxFormBuilder]]

===Objective-C / Swift based===
* [[Cocoa (API)|Cocoa]] (modern) and [[Carbon (API)|Carbon]] (deprecated).
** [[Xcode]]
* [[GNUstep]] (formerly [[OpenStep]])
** [[Gorm (computing)|Gorm]]

===Java based===
* [[Android Studio]], XML-based GUI layout
* [[NetBeans#GUI design tool|NetBeans GUI design tool]]

===HTML/JavaScript based===
* [[Adobe Dreamweaver]]

=== Python based ===

=== Object Pascal based===
* [[Delphi (programming language)|Delphi]] / VCL ([[Visual Component Library]])
* [[Lazarus (IDE)|Lazarus]] / LCL ([[Lazarus Component Library]])

=== Tk framework based ===
* [[Tk (framework)]] for [[Tcl]]
** [[ActiveState Komodo]] (No longer{{Since when|date = April 2015}} has a GUI builder)

===Visual Basic based===
* [[Universal Windows Platform|UWP]] / [[Windows Presentation Foundation]] / [[WinForms]]
** Microsoft [[Visual Studio | Visual Studio XAML Editor]], [[XAML]] based GUI layout
** Microsoft [[Expression Blend]]

=== Other tools ===
* [[Adobe Animate]]
* [[App Inventor for Android]]
* [[AutoIt]]
* [[Creately]]
* [[Embedded Wizard]]
* [[Graphics Environment Manager|GEM]]
* [[Interface Builder]]
* [[LucidChart]]
* [[OpenWindows]]
* [[Resource construction set]]
* [[Stetic]]
* [[Scaleform]]
* [[Wavemaker]]

==List of development environments==

===IDEs with GUI builders ([[Rapid application development|RAD]] [[Integrated development environment|IDEs]])===
* [[4th Dimension (software)|4D]]
* [[ActiveState Komodo]] (No longer{{Since when|date = April 2015}} has a GUI builder)
* [[Android Studio]]
* [[Anjuta]]
* [[AutoIt3]]
* [[C++Builder]]
* [[Clarion (programming language)|Clarion]]
* [[Code::Blocks]]
* [[CodeLite]]
* [[dBase]]
* [[Delphi (software)|Delphi/RAD Studio]]
* [[Embedded Wizard]]
* [[Eclipse (software)|Eclipse]]
* [[Gambas]]
* [[IntelliJ IDEA]]
* [[QB64|InForm]]
* [[JDeveloper]]
* [[KDevelop]]
* [[LabWindows/CVI]]
* [[LANSA (development environment)|LANSA]]
* [[Lazarus (software)|Lazarus]]
* [[Liberty BASIC]]
* [[Microsoft Visual Studio]]
* [[MonoDevelop]]
* [[Free Pascal#MSEide|MSEide+MSEgui]]
* [[MyEclipse]]
* [[NetBeans]]
* [[OutSystems]]
* [[PascalABC.NET]]
* [[JUCE|Projucer]]
* [[Purebasic]]
* [[Qt Creator]]
* [[SharpDevelop]]
* [[Softwell Maker]]
* [[Ultimate++|U++]]
* [[VB6]]
* [[FreeBASIC|WinFBE]]
* [[Xcode]]
* [[Xojo]]

== See also ==
* [[Model–view–controller]]
* [[Web template system]]
* [[Rapid application development]] (RAD)
* [[Human interface guidelines]] (HIG)
* [[Human interface device]]
* [[User interface markup language]]
* [[User interface modeling]]
* [[Linux on the desktop]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

{{GUI builders}}
{{Graphical control elements}}

[[Category:Graphical control elements]]
[[Category:Graphical user interfaces|builder]]
[[Category:User interface builders|*]]

Graphical user interface builder - Revision history

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