How to Build a Modern Admin Dashboard with shadcn/ui in 2026

Five years ago, building an admin dashboard meant cobbling together mismatched UI libraries, hunting for free templates, and spending weeks on a shell that still felt half-baked. I know because I did exactly that — more times than I'd like to admit. Things are different now. shadcn/ui has become the go-to foundation for admin interfaces, and the ecosystem around it has matured enough that you can ship production-grade dashboards in days. Not weeks. Days. This guide covers the full process — arch