AugmentClaude

Portable Text Serializer

Render Portable Text to React, Vue, HTML, Markdown, and plain text.

Installation

  1. Make sure Claude is on your device and in your terminal.

    Skills load from ~/.claude/skills/ when Claude Code starts up β€” so you need it on your machine first. If you don't have it yet, install it once with the command below, then run claude in any terminal to verify.

    One-time setup
    npm i -g @anthropic-ai/claude-code

    Already have it? Skip ahead.

  2. Paste into Claude Code or into your terminal.

    This copies the whole skill folder into ~/.claude/skills/portable-text-serialization-sanity-io/ β€” the SKILL.md plus any scripts, reference docs, or templates the skill ships with. Safe default: works for every skill.

    Faster alternative (instruction-only skills)

    Skips the clone and grabs only the SKILL.md file. Don't use this if the skill ships Python scripts, reference markdowns, or asset templates β€” they won't be downloaded and the skill will fail when it tries to load them.

    Quick install (SKILL.md only)
    Sign up to copy
  3. Restart Claude Code.

    Quit and reopen Claude Code (or any other agent that loads from ~/.claude/skills/). New skills are picked up on startup.

  4. Just ask Claude.

    Skills auto-activate when your request matches the skill's description β€” no slash command needed. Trigger phrases live in the skill's own frontmatter; you can read them in the β€œWhat this skill does” section above.

Prefer to read the source first? Open on GitHub.

When Claude uses it

Render and serialize Portable Text to React, Svelte, Vue, Astro, HTML, Markdown, and plain text. Use when implementing Portable Text rendering in any frontend framework, building custom serializers for non-standard block types, converting Portable Text to HTML strings server-side, converting Portable Text to Markdown, extracting plain text from Portable Text, or troubleshooting rendering issues with marks, blocks, lists, or custom types.

What this skill does

Portable Text Serialization

Render Portable Text content across frameworks using the @portabletext/* library family. Each library follows the same component-mapping pattern: you provide a components object that maps PT node types to framework-specific renderers.

Portable Text Structure (Quick Reference)

PT is an array of blocks. Each block has _type, optional style, children (spans), markDefs, listItem, and level.

Root array
β”œβ”€β”€ block (_type: "block")
β”‚   β”œβ”€β”€ style: "normal" | "h1" | "h2" | "blockquote" | ...
β”‚   β”œβ”€β”€ children: [span, span, ...]
β”‚   β”‚   └── span: { _type: "span", text: "...", marks: ["strong", "<markDefKey>"] }
β”‚   β”œβ”€β”€ markDefs: [{ _key, _type: "link", href: "..." }, ...]
β”‚   β”œβ”€β”€ listItem: "bullet" | "number" (optional)
β”‚   └── level: 1, 2, 3... (optional, for nested lists)
β”œβ”€β”€ custom block (_type: "image" | "code" | any custom type)
└── ...more blocks

Marks come in two forms:

  • Decorators: string values in marks[] like "strong", "em", "underline", "code"
  • Annotations: keys in marks[] referencing entries in markDefs[] (e.g., links, internal references)

Component Mapping Pattern (All Frameworks)

Every @portabletext/* library accepts a components object with these keys:

KeyRendersProps/Data
typesCustom block/inline types (image, code, CTA)value (the block data)
marksDecorators + annotationschildren + value (mark data)
blockBlock styles (h1, normal, blockquote)children
listList wrappers (ul, ol)children
listItemList itemschildren
hardBreakLine breaks within a blockβ€”

Framework-Specific Rules

Read the rule file matching your framework:

  • React / Next.js: rules/react.md β€” @portabletext/react or next-sanity
  • Svelte / SvelteKit: rules/svelte.md β€” @portabletext/svelte
  • Vue / Nuxt: rules/vue.md β€” @portabletext/vue
  • Astro: rules/astro.md β€” astro-portabletext
  • HTML (server-side): rules/html.md β€” @portabletext/to-html
  • Markdown: rules/markdown.md β€” @portabletext/markdown
  • Plain text extraction: rules/plain-text.md β€” @portabletext/toolkit

Additional Community Serializers

These are listed on portabletext.org but don't have dedicated rule files:

TargetPackage
React Native@portabletext/react-native-portabletext
React PDF@portabletext/react-pdf-portabletext
Solidsolid-portabletext
Qwikportabletext-qwik
Shopify Liquidportable-text-to-liquid
PHPsanity-php (SanityBlockContent class)
Pythonportabletext-html
C# / .NETdotnet-portable-text
Dart / Flutterflutter_sanity_portable_text

Common Patterns (All Frameworks)

Custom Types Need Explicit Components

PT renderers only handle standard blocks by default. Custom types (image, code, callToAction, etc.) require explicit component mappings β€” they won't render otherwise.

Keep Components Object Stable

In React/Vue, define components outside the render function or memoize it. Recreating on every render causes unnecessary re-renders.

Handle Missing Components Gracefully

All libraries accept onMissingComponent to control behavior when encountering unknown types:

  • false β€” suppress warnings
  • Custom function β€” log or report

Querying PT with GROQ

Always expand references inside custom blocks:

body[]{
  ...,
  _type == "image" => {
    ...,
    asset->
  },
  markDefs[]{
    ...,
    _type == "internalLink" => {
      ...,
      "slug": @.reference->slug.current
    }
  }
}

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