---
title: Side Menus
slug: experience/side-menus
description: Menus in the Purple Experience are used to enable dynamic configuration of 'lists' where the users may navigate to different parts of the app or website or also to external URLs.
docTags: 
createdAt: 2022-10-11T13:27:26.000Z
---

Side menus are menus that are usually opened using a menu button, which then slide in from either the left or right side of the screen. They usually contain targets for quick navigation across the app or website but also allow linking to external pages.

**There are multiple ways to configure menus in the context of the Purple Experience:**

- [Experience side menus](docId\:GccHvJgLeC2A4GHIK7-WP) allow building custom side menu with the standard components. They can either be configured statically or loaded from a file from within the dynamic resources, allowing the menu to be available offline as well.
- Using [Hub Menus](docId:0o6OmsOPGeqQW7B0FgK5e), it is possible to configure menus in the Hub, which are then loaded via the Purple API, allowing menus to be dynamically modified. Note that this approach does not offer offline availability.
- The [app\_menu.xml](docId\:nxi0s2KWS4-m2o0VDLC31) provides a way to configure simple native app menus, which are also available offline.

:::hint{type="danger"}
We are working on deprecating **app\_menu.xml** menus fully and consolidating for a single source of truth for menus. 
:::

# Benefits and Limitations

### Purple Experience components

- wide range of possibilities, allowing simple and complex menus
- standard styling via css
- available offline
- accessible

### Purple Cloud Menus

- dynamically configurable through the hub
- allows nested menus
- Requires internet connectivity

### App Menus

- simple configuration via app\_menu.xml
- no nesting
- available when offline
- native UI
- limited build-time styling options