What is shapeless?

sh0hei/shapeless — explained in plain English

Analysis updated 2026-07-18 · repo last pushed 2026-02-13

ScalaAudience · developerComplexity · 4/5MaintainedSetup · moderate

Mindmap

mindmap
  root((Shapeless))
    What it does
      Less boilerplate
      Reusable data logic
      Compile-time generation
    How it works
      Type system introspection
      Case class structure
      No runtime cost
    Use cases
      JSON conversion
      Equality checks
      Database mapping
    Audience
      Scala developers
      Library authors
    Status
      Mature
      Production-used
      Active community

mindmap root((Shapeless)) What it does Less boilerplate Reusable data logic Compile-time generation How it works Type system introspection Case class structure No runtime cost Use cases JSON conversion Equality checks Database mapping Audience Scala developers Library authors Status Mature Production-used Active community

What do people build with it?

USE CASE 1

Automatically generate JSON conversion, equality checks, or serialization code for any Scala case class without writing it by hand for each one.

USE CASE 2

Build a library that needs to work flexibly with user-defined data structures without knowing their shape in advance.

USE CASE 3

Eliminate repeated boilerplate when the same logic pattern needs to apply across many different data types.

What is it built with?

Scala

How does it compare?

	sh0hei/shapeless	cakiki/database	janikdotzel/akka-http-quickstart-scala
Language	Scala	Scala	Scala
Last pushed	2026-02-13	2026-03-13	2023-05-19
Maintenance	Maintained	Maintained	Dormant
Setup difficulty	moderate	easy	easy
Complexity	4/5	2/5	2/5
Audience	developer	researcher	developer

Figures from each repo's GitHub metadata at analysis time.

How do you get it running?

Difficulty · moderate Time to first run · 1h+

Requires familiarity with Scala's type system, the compile-time metaprogramming style has a learning curve.

Copy-paste prompts

Prompt 1

Show me how to use Shapeless to automatically derive JSON encoding for a Scala case class.

Prompt 2

Help me understand how Shapeless inspects a case class's fields at compile time to generate reusable code.

Prompt 3

I'm writing a Scala library that needs to work with arbitrary case classes. How can Shapeless help me avoid writing type-specific code?

Prompt 4

Walk me through a beginner-friendly example of using Shapeless to compare two case class instances for equality.

Frequently asked questions