Alright, let's get nerdy for a minute because you probably installed Lenis for smooth scrolling and don’t even know the whole real story behind it. Originally, Lenis wasn’t built just to make your site scroll like butter (even though that’s a pretty nice side effect). No, the real mission was to tackle a major pain point in web development that most folks don't realize exists—synchronizing WebGL and the DOM while scrolling.
You see, WebGL and the DOM don’t play nicely together when you’re scrolling. With native scrolling, trying to keep WebGL animations in sync with DOM elements is like trying to teach a cat to fetch—it just doesn’t want to cooperate. There’s a constant fight over control, which means you end up with janky animations, weird timing issues, and an overall frustrating experience for developers and users alike. Lenis came in as the referee, letting us manage the scroll position smoothly and precisely, so WebGL and the DOM can finally share the spotlight.
But here’s the kicker—when we made Lenis to solve that problem, something interesting happened. Thanks to its ability to interpolate (or “lerp,” for the cool kids) the scroll position, it also created a super-smooth scrolling experience. And as it turns out, everyone just loves smooth scrolling. So much so that this “happy little accident” quickly overshadowed the original problem Lenis was built to solve. People started adopting it just for the silky smooth scrolling, completely unaware that Lenis was originally the secret weapon for complex WebGL-DOM synchronization.
If you’re here thinking, “I just wanted my site to scroll like butter,” don’t worry—you’re not alone! Smooth scrolling is awesome, and Lenis does it really well. But for those of you who really want to know, Lenis is more than just a pretty face. It’s here to handle the hard stuff under the hood and to give you the control you need to pull off those super-synced, glitch-free animations.
In short: Lenis is the smooth scroll library that became famous by accident. So, next time you add it to your project, just know that it's not just a scrolling effect—it's a powerhouse tool for handling the impossible.