Menu
Simply put, if you have a div, and the elements inside are set to “display:inline-block” then you can just use “text-align:center” to center them inside.
To move the inner div container to the centre of the parent div we have to use the margin property of style attribute. We can adjust the space around any HTML element by this margin property just by providing desired values to it. Now here comes the role of this property in adjusting the inner div.
The CSS float property is used to set or return the horizontal alignment of elements. But this property allows an element to float only right or left side of the parent body with rest of the elements wrapped around it. There is no way to float center in CSS layout.
Just add margin: auto and a fixed width to the element you want to center, and the margins will force the element to center. There are a number of old methods to center multiple divs, but this is now much easier to do using modern CSS techniques.
First, remove the float attribute on the inner divs. Then, put text-align: center on the main outer div. And for the inner divs,
use display: inline-block. Might also be wise to give them explicit widths too.
<div style="margin: auto 1.5em; display: inline-block;">
<img title="Nadia Bjorlin" alt="Nadia Bjorlin" src="headshot.nadia.png"/>
<br/>
Nadia Bjorlin
</div>
With Flexbox you can easily horizontally (and vertically) center floated children inside a div.
So if you have simple markup like so:
<div class="wpr">
<span></span>
<span></span>
<span></span>
<span></span>
<span></span>
</div>
with CSS:
.wpr
{
width: 400px;
height: 100px;
background: pink;
padding: 10px 30px;
}
.wpr span
{
width: 50px;
height: 50px;
background: green;
float: left; /* **children floated left** */
margin: 0 5px;
}
(This is the (expected - and undesirable) RESULT)
Now add the following rules to the wrapper:
display: flex;
justify-content: center; /* align horizontal */
and the floated children get aligned center (DEMO)
Just for fun, to get vertical alignment as well just add:
align-items: center; /* align vertical */
I accomplished the above using relative positioning and floating to the right.
HTML code:
<div class="clearfix">
<div class="outer-div">
<div class="inner-div">
<div class="floating-div">Float 1</div>
<div class="floating-div">Float 2</div>
<div class="floating-div">Float 3</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
CSS:
.outer-div { position: relative; float: right; right: 50%; }
.inner-div { position: relative; float: right; right: -50%; }
.floating-div { float: left; border: 1px solid red; margin: 0 1.5em; }
.clearfix:before,
.clearfix:after { content: " "; display: table; }
.clearfix:after { clear: both; }
.clearfix { *zoom: 1; }
JSFiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/MJ9yp/
This will work in IE8 and up, but not earlier (surprise, surprise!)
I do not recall the source of this method unfortunately, so I cannot give credit to the original author. If anybody else knows, please post the link!
The following solution does not use inline blocks. However, it requires two helper divs:
.ca-outer {
overflow: hidden;
background: #FFC;
}
.ca-inner {
float: left;
position: relative;
left: 50%;
background: #FDD;
}
.content {
float: left;
position: relative;
left: -50%;
background: #080;
}
/* examples */
div.content > div {
float: left;
margin: 10px;
width: 100px;
height: 100px;
background: #FFF;
}
ul.content {
padding: 0;
list-style-type: none;
}
ul.content > li {
margin: 10px;
background: #FFF;
}<div class="ca-outer">
<div class="ca-inner">
<div class="content">
<div>Box 1</div>
<div>Box 2</div>
<div>Box 3</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<hr>
<div class="ca-outer">
<div class="ca-inner">
<ul class="content">
<li>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit.</li>
<li>Nullam efficitur nulla in libero consectetur dictum ac a sem.</li>
<li>Suspendisse iaculis risus ut dapibus cursus.</li>
</ul>
</div>
</div>display: inline-block; won't work in any of IE browsers. Here is what I used.
// change the width of #boxContainer to
// 1-2 pixels higher than total width of the boxes inside:
#boxContainer {
width: 800px;
height: auto;
text-align: center;
margin-left: auto;
margin-right: auto;
}
#Box{
width: 240px;
height: 90px;
background-color: #FFF;
float: left;
margin-left: 10px;
margin-right: 10px;
}
Solution:
<!DOCTYPE HTML>
<html>
<head>
<title>Knowledge is Power</title>
<script src="js/jquery.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
</script>
<style type="text/css">
#outer {
text-align:center;
width:100%;
height:200px;
background:red;
}
#inner {
display:inline-block;
height:200px;
background:yellow;
}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<div id="outer">
<div id="inner">Hello, I am Touhid Rahman. The man in Light</div>
</div>
</body>
</html>
In my case, I could not get the answer by @Sampson to work for me, at best I got a single column centered on the page. In the process however, I learned how the float actually works and created this solution. At it's core the fix is very simple but hard to find as evident by this thread which has had more than 146k views at the time of this post without mention.
All that is needed is to total the amount of screen space width that the desired layout will occupy then make the parent the same width and apply margin:auto. That's it!
The elements in the layout will dictate the width and height of the "outer" div. Take each "myFloat" or element's width or height + its borders + its margins and its paddings and add them all together. Then add the other elements together in the same fashion. This will give you the parent width. They can all be somewhat different sizes and you can do this with fewer or more elements.
Ex.(each element has 2 sides so border, margin and padding get multiplied x2)
So an element that has a width of 10px, border 2px, margin 6px, padding 3px would look like this: 10 + 4 + 12 + 6 = 32
Then add all of your element's totaled widths together.
Element 1 = 32
Element 2 = 24
Element 3 = 32
Element 4 = 24
In this example the width for the "outer" div would be 112.
.outer {
/* floats + margins + borders = 270 */
max-width: 270px;
margin: auto;
height: 80px;
border: 1px;
border-style: solid;
}
.myFloat {
/* 3 floats x 50px = 150px */
width: 50px;
/* 6 margins x 10px = 60 */
margin: 10px;
/* 6 borders x 10px = 60 */
border: 10px solid #6B6B6B;
float: left;
text-align: center;
height: 40px;
}<div class="outer">
<div class="myFloat">Float 1</div>
<div class="myFloat">Float 2</div>
<div class="myFloat">Float 3</div>
</div>If you love us? You can donate to us via Paypal or buy me a coffee so we can maintain and grow! Thank you!
Donate Us With