What is FlexBox? 🤔
This tool provides an efficient way to lay out, align and distribute space among items in a container, even when we don't know each element size.
Browser compatibility ✔
Nowadays, flexbox is supported by all modern browsers.
Concepts 💡
Consider the following image as a reference for the next concepts:
display
This property defines a flex container, so all container's children will have a flex context.
.container {
display: flex;
}
flex-direction
Using this property we set the main-axis. Flexbox is single-direction, so we can show our items in horizontal rows or vertical columns.
.container {
flex-direction: row | row-reverse | column | column-reverse;
}
order
With Flexbox we can change the order of each item inside the container, using order attribute. By default, we'll see the same order displayed on our HTML.
.container {
display: flex;
}
.item {
order: <integer>;
}
flex-grow
This attribute defines what amount of the available space inside our container the item should take. It's useful when we want to let an item grow if necessary.
.item {
flex-grow: <number>; /* Default 0 */
}
flex-wrap
Flexbox will always try to show all the items in one line. To prevent this, if necessary, we can use flex-wrap attribute.
nowrap - default value. Items in one line.
wrap - multiple lines from top to bottom.
wrap-reverse - multiple lines from bottom to top.
.container {
flex-wrap: nowrap | wrap | wrap-reverse;
}
flex-shrink
This attribute defines the ability for an item to shrink.
.item {
flex-shrink: <number>; /* Default 1 */
}
flex
Using this property we can avoid using flex-grow, flex-shrink and flex-basis. The second parameter is flex-shrink, the third parameter is flex-basis. Default 0 1 auto.
.item{
flex: none | [ <'flex-grow'> <'flex-shrink'>? || <'flex-basis'> ];
}
justify-content
With this attribute, we define the container's children alignment along the main axis.
flex-start - default value. Items aligned to the left.
flex-end - items aligned to the right.
center - items centered
space-between - items evenly distributed in the line. First item on the left, last item on the right.
space-around - items evenly distributed with equal space around them.
space-evenly - equal space between two items.
.container {
justify-content: flex-start | flex-end | center | space-between | space-around | space-evenly;
}
align-items
Define how our items will behave on the opposite axis to the main axis. (It's always perpendicular)
flex-end - cross-end margin edge of the items is placed on the cross-end line
flex-start - cross-start margin edge of the items is placed on the cross-start line
stretch - default - fill the container considering min-width/max-width
center - items centered
baseline - items aligned based on their baselines align
.container {
align-items: stretch | flex-start | flex-end | center | baseline;
}
align-self
Using this attribute we can override the default alignment for a specific item.
.item {
align-self: auto | flex-start | flex-end | center | baseline | stretch;
}
align-content
We can use this attribute to align container's lines within when there is extra space in the cross-axis.
Pro tip: use this attribute only when there is more than one line of items inside your container.
stretch - default - the content will take up the remaining space
flex-start - lines aligned to the start of the container
flex-end - lines aligned to the end of the container
center - lines aligned to the center
space-between - lines evenly distributed, first line is at the start and last line is at the end of the container
space-around - lines evenly distributed with equal space around them
.container {
align-content: flex-start | flex-end | center | space-between | space-around | stretch;
}
Playground 👨💻
Are you curious? Give it a try, play with it.
Thanks 🙌
Hope this article helps you. Feel free to contact me if you have any question.
Top comments (4)
Good article to get an overview, especially the graphics. One thing I noticed: the code for flex-grow refers to order.
Thanks for your feedback! 😁
Good catch, I've already fix it.
Great!
My go-to flexbox cheat sheet