Typescript RefForwardingComponent not working

Question

I am trying to make my component accept a ref.

I have a component like so:

const MyComponent: RefForwardingComponent<HTMLDivElement, IMyComponentProps> = (props, ref) => {
    return <div ref={ref}>Hoopla</div>
}

But when I try to pass a ref to is like so:

<MyComponent ref={myRef}></MyComponent>

... I get this error:

Property 'ref' does not exist on type 'IntrinsicAttributes & IMyComponentProps & { children?: ReactNode; }'.ts(2322)

What am I doing wrong?

Answer 1

RefForwardingComponent is a render function, which receives props and ref parameters and returns a React node - it is no component:

The second ref argument only exists when you define a component with React.forwardRef call. Regular function or class components don’t receive the ref argument, and ref is not available in props either. (docs)

That is also the reason, why RefForwardingComponent is deprecated in favor of ForwardRefRenderFunction, which is functionally equivalent, but has a different name to make the distinction clearer.

You use React.forwardRef to turn the render function into an actual component that accepts refs:

import React, { ForwardRefRenderFunction } from 'react'

type IMyComponentProps = { a: string }
const MyComponentRenderFn: ForwardRefRenderFunction<HTMLDivElement, IMyComponentProps> =
    (props, ref) => <div ref={ref}>Hoopla</div>

const MyComponent = React.forwardRef(MyComponentRenderFn);
const myRef = React.createRef<HTMLDivElement>();

<MyComponent a="foo" ref={myRef} />