Chemical vapor deposition of metal–organic frameworks (MOF-CVD) will facilitate the integration of porous and crystalline coatings in electronic devices. In the two-step MOF-CVD process, a precursor layer is first deposited and subsequently converted to a MOF through exposure to linker vapor. We herein report the impact of different metal oxide and metalcone layers as precursors for zeolitic imidazolate framework ZIF-8 films.