XControl 1 is a compiled .NET library that adds five skinnable Windows Forms controls to a desktop application: two buttons, two progress bars, a separator and a textbox. Each control exposes a set of design-time properties, all prefixed with an X, that let a developer change gradients, hover and pressed states, icons, banner text and numeric-only input without writing painting code. It suits C# and VB.NET developers building WinForms tools who want a more contemporary look than the stock toolbox provides, and it is priced at $7 on ThemeForest.
The package is small and self-contained. The download holds the DLL with the precompiled controls plus a demo application that shows how each one behaves, so the controls can be referenced and dragged onto a form in the same way as any built-in component. The developer behind the listing publishes under the name XControl, and the sales counter has not been disclosed, so there is no purchase history to weigh up either way.
What the XControl 1 .NET custom control library actually adds to a WinForms project
The value here is not that these controls do something impossible with the standard toolbox. It is that they remove the need to subclass a control and override OnPaint to get a gradient fill, a hover colour or an icon that swaps on click. Everything is exposed as a property, which means the look can be tuned in the Visual Studio properties grid or set in code at runtime.
Buttons with full state control
Each button carries separate colour pairs for its resting, hover and pressed states, so a two-stop gradient can shift as the pointer moves across it. The XAnimato flag animates that gradient, which gives a subtle sense of motion without any timer code. Icons are handled through three separate image properties — one for the normal state, one for hover and one for pressed — plus an XImagePosition setting for placement. Text colour is likewise split into three states. In practice this means a toolbar of buttons can be given a consistent visual language in minutes rather than an afternoon of custom drawing.
Progress bars, including a multi-stage variant
The standard progress bar takes a background colour, a fill colour, an optional border and a centred percentage label whose text colour is configurable. The ProgressBarLevel control is the more interesting one: it can shift through three different colours at three different percentage thresholds. That is a natural fit for anything that needs to signal severity rather than just completion — disk usage, memory pressure, a scoring meter, a quota indicator. A bar that turns amber at 60 percent and red at 85 percent communicates more than a number does.
Textbox banners and numeric input
The textbox supports a banner: placeholder text that sits inside the field and disappears once typing begins. Its colour, font and wording are all properties, and the colour changes when the control takes focus. There is also an XOnlyNumer switch that restricts input to digits, which saves writing a KeyPress handler and validating on every keystroke. The separator is a single-colour horizontal line, useful for grouping sections of a form without drawing a Panel.
Where this .NET custom control fits, and where it does not
This is a Windows Forms product. It has no use in WPF, UWP, WinUI, MAUI, ASP.NET or Blazor projects, and it will not help anyone building a web interface. Within WinForms, the fit is broad: internal business tools, data entry applications, point-of-sale front ends, configuration utilities, kiosk software, admin dashboards and small desktop products that ship to a handful of machines or a few thousand.
It is a particularly good match for a small team or a solo developer who has inherited a functional but dated-looking desktop application and wants to modernise the interface without a rewrite. Swapping stock buttons and progress bars for these is a contained change that touches individual controls rather than form architecture.
The wrong choice is a project with a strict design system or an accessibility requirement. The controls are gradient-based and image-driven, and the vendor does not state whether they support high-contrast Windows themes, screen reader labels or DPI scaling behaviour. A team that must pass a formal accessibility audit should treat that silence as a reason to test carefully before committing. It is also the wrong choice for anyone who needs a large component suite — grids, charts, schedulers, docking panels — because five controls is a narrow slice of that territory.
What setup involves in practice
Installation is about as light as it gets for a commercial component. Add the DLL as a reference in the project, and the controls should appear in the toolbox for drag-and-drop placement. The included demo application is the practical reference: it shows each control in a working form, which is faster than reading a property list. There is no installer, no licence key mechanism mentioned, and no configuration file to edit.
The prerequisite is a .NET development environment with Windows Forms support — Visual Studio is the obvious choice, and the vendor tags indicate both C# and VB.NET are intended. Because the DLL is precompiled, the target framework version it was built against matters; the listing does not state which one, so a developer should confirm compatibility with their project before purchase rather than after. For a single form, wiring up a handful of controls and matching colours to an existing palette is realistically under an hour. Restyling an entire multi-form application is a longer job, but the work is repetitive rather than difficult.
Strengths and limitations
Strengths
- Every visual state — normal, hover, pressed — is exposed as a property, so no custom painting code is required.
- The gradient animation flag adds motion with a single boolean rather than a timer and redraw loop.
- The ProgressBarLevel control’s three-threshold colour change is genuinely useful for status and capacity indicators.
- The textbox banner and numeric-only mode cover two of the most commonly hand-coded input behaviours.
- The demo application ships with the DLL, so behaviour can be evaluated before integration.
- At $7 the cost is low enough that a single saved afternoon of custom control work pays for it.
Limitations
- Five controls is a small library. There is no grid, chart, tree, tab or date picker, so it complements a component suite rather than replacing one.
- The vendor does not state which .NET Framework or .NET version the DLL targets, which is the single most important compatibility fact for a compiled control.
- Accessibility support is not addressed. High-contrast mode, screen reader names and keyboard focus indicators are unmentioned, and gradient-filled custom-drawn controls frequently fail these checks.
- DPI scaling behaviour is not documented, which matters on modern high-resolution displays where custom-painted controls can render blurry or misaligned.
- There is no stated update history, changelog or support policy, so it is unclear how the library will be maintained against future framework releases.
- No sales figures are published, which makes it hard to judge how widely the controls have been used in production.
How XControl 1, .Net custom control miscellaneous compares with the alternatives
The realistic alternatives fall into three groups. The first is doing nothing and using the stock WinForms controls, which costs nothing and carries no compatibility risk but leaves the application looking like it was built a decade ago. The second is a full commercial component suite, which brings dozens of controls, documented accessibility behaviour, DPI handling and a support contract — at a price several orders of magnitude higher and with a much larger footprint in the project.
The third, and the closest comparison, is writing the custom painting yourself. A developer who subclasses Button and overrides OnPaint can produce a gradient button with hover states, and it will target exactly the framework version in use. The trade-off is time and maintenance: every state combination has to be handled, tested and kept working. XControl 1 sits between the free-but-dated option and the expensive suite, and it wins on effort saved per dollar. It loses on breadth, documentation and any assurance about long-term maintenance. For a project that needs five specific controls styled a particular way, that is a reasonable trade. For a project that needs a full UI toolkit, it is not.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is XControl 1, .Net custom control used for?
It is used to give Windows Forms applications a more modern interface without writing custom painting code. The library provides two buttons, two progress bars, a separator and a textbox, each with design-time properties for gradients, hover and pressed colours, icons, percentage labels and placeholder text. Developers reference the DLL and drag the controls onto a form.
Does XControl 1 work with VB.NET as well as C#?
Yes. The vendor tags list both C# and VB.NET, and the controls are compiled into a single .NET DLL, which any .NET language can reference. Because the controls are precompiled rather than shipped as source, the same assembly works in either language, and the demo application shows them in use.
Can the progress bar change colour at different percentages?
Yes, through the ProgressBarLevel control. It supports three separate colours tied to three different percentage thresholds, so the bar can shift appearance as a value rises. The standard ProgressBar control is simpler, offering a background colour, a fill colour, an optional border and a centred percentage label.
Is XControl 1 suitable for a large commercial application?
Only as a supplement. Five controls cannot cover the needs of a large application on their own, and the vendor does not document accessibility, DPI scaling or framework version support. It works well for styling specific controls in a WinForms project, but a full component suite is the safer foundation for a large commercial build.
Verdict
XControl 1 is worth buying for a WinForms developer who needs gradient buttons, a status-aware progress bar, a placeholder textbox or a numeric-only field and would otherwise spend a day writing paint handlers. The property set is thorough for the controls it covers, the demo makes evaluation quick, and $7 is a trivial cost against the time saved. It is not the right purchase for anyone working outside Windows Forms, for a team that needs documented accessibility and DPI behaviour, or for a project that requires a broad component library rather than five styled controls. The absence of any stated target framework version is the detail to resolve before buying, because a compiled control that will not load into the project is worth nothing regardless of price.
