Upgrading Kepler.gl from 2.x to in 3.x. Will it work?

[delfrrr]

Hey, I'm maintaining Dekart, an open-source backend for Kepler.gl.

Last week I started upgrading to Kepler.gl 3.x — here’s a quick breakdown of what I ran into:

🔧 Setup & Dependencies

I was initially running everything inside a Create React App project. These are the key dependencies I used:

"@kepler.gl/actions": "^3.1.2",
"@kepler.gl/components": "^3.1.2",
"@kepler.gl/reducers": "^3.1.2"

Had to resolve some frontend conflicts using overrides in package.json:

"overrides": {
  "react": "^17.0.2",
  "react-dom": "^17.0.2",
  "react-markdown": "^8.0.7",
  "react-redux": "^7.1.3",
  "styled-components": "^5.2.1"
}

Also, note that imports have changed. Example of a correct import:

import { KeplerGl } from '@kepler.gl/components';

README example is wrong, this is correct import of enhanceReduxMiddleware

import { enhanceReduxMiddleware } from '@kepler.gl/reducers'

🐛 Issues Encountered

• Got everything compiling, but GeoJSON layers didn't render (no errors in logs).
• Found this useful StackOverflow post:
  👉 https://stackoverflow.com/questions/78922858/kepler-gl-polygon-layer-not-showing

⚡️ Solution

Eventually I migrated to Vite, and everything started working reliably.

Also worth noting:
Kepler's internal APIs still work as expected.
In Dekart, we use them heavily (toggling side panels, reordering layers, etc), and most of that still functions without issue.

🔄 Config Compatibility

I tested map configs from Kepler.gl 2.x → 3.x and they seem to load correctly without changes.

🧪 What’s Next?

I'll continue testing with a few Dekart users and will report here if any other breaking changes appear.

🔔 Stay tuned: hit subscribe for updates in this thread to learn if the update was successful

[am2222]

@delfrrr do you have any suggestions for using kepler.gl with vite? I keep getting lots of incompatible package issues

[delfrrr]

@am2222 hey, yes, it works perfectly. Here is my package.json, for the reference.

I will share the complete working project Kepler + Vite when it merges to the open-source branch of Dekart.

{
  "name": "dekart",
  "version": "0.18.5",
  "private": true,
  "dependencies": {
    "@improbable-eng/grpc-web": "^0.15.0",
    "@kepler.gl/actions": "^3.1.2",
    "@kepler.gl/components": "^3.1.2",
    "@kepler.gl/reducers": "^3.1.2",
    "@testing-library/user-event": "^12.5.0",
    "ace-builds": "^1.36.5",
    "ajv": "^8.17.1",
    "antd": "^4.9.4",
    "assert": "^2.1.0",
    "classnames": "^2.2.6",
    "copy-to-clipboard": "^3.3.1",
    "crypto-js": "^4.1.1",
    "cypress": "^13.15.0",
    "dekart-proto": "file:./proto",
    "google-protobuf": "^3.14.0",
    "immer": "^9.0.7",
    "js-md5": "^0.8.3",
    "luxon": "^1.25.0",
    "pretty-bytes": "^5.5.0",
    "re-resizable": "^6.9.11",
    "react": "^17.0.2",
    "react-ace": "^13.0.0",
    "react-dom": "^17.0.2",
    "react-error-overlay": "^6.0.9",
    "react-markdown": "^8.0.7",
    "react-redux": "^7.1.3",
    "react-router-dom": "^5.2.0",
    "react-virtualized": "^9.22.3",
    "redux": "^4.0.5",
    "redux-logger": "^3.0.6",
    "redux-thunk": "^2.3.0",
    "semver": "^7.3.5",
    "styled-components": "^5.2.1",
    "web-vitals": "^0.2.4"
  },
  "scripts": {
    "start": "vite dev",
    "build": "vite build",
    "preview": "vite preview",
    "test": "vitest",
    "lint": "standard ./src/client ",
    "postinstall": "make proto-copy-to-node"
  },
  "eslintConfig": {
    "globals": {
      "cy": true
    },
    "extends": [
      "react-app",
      "react-app/jest",
      "plugin:cypress/recommended"
    ]
  },
  "browserslist": {
    "production": [
      ">2.0%",
      "not dead",
      "not op_mini all"
    ],
    "development": [
      "last 1 chrome version",
      "last 1 firefox version",
      "last 1 safari version"
    ]
  },
  "devDependencies": {
    "@testing-library/jest-dom": "^6.6.3",
    "@testing-library/react": "^16.3.0",
    "@vitejs/plugin-react": "^4.4.1",
    "cypress-file-upload": "^5.0.8",
    "eslint-plugin-cypress": "^2.12.1",
    "jsdom": "^26.1.0",
    "standard": "^17.0.0",
    "vite": "^6.3.5",
    "vitest": "^3.1.3"
  },
  "overrides": {
    "react-dev-utils": {
      "immer": "$immer"
    },
    "react": "^17.0.2",
    "react-dom": "^17.0.2",
    "react-markdown": "^8.0.7",
    "react-redux": "^7.1.3",
    "styled-components": "^5.2.1"
  }
}

[am2222]

Thanks @delfrrr !

[delfrrr]

@am2222 did it help?