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center content in css

Code snippet for how to center content in css with sample and detail explanation

Centering content in CSS is an important and commonly used technique, that can make your website or app interface aesthetically pleasing. It adds to the users’ interaction and provides a balanced view of the web pages.

Code Snippet for Centering Content in CSS

Depending on what you want to center, whether it is a block level element or an inline element, the method for centering can vary. Here is a simple CSS snippet for centering text within a div:

.center-div {
    display: flex;
    align-items: center;
    justify-content: center;
}

With this snippet, any content within a div assigned the class .center-div will be centered both vertically and horizontally.

Code Explanation for Centering Content in CSS

Let’s break down what each of these properties are doing:

  1. display: flex; This property sets the display context to flex, which means the children of the container can be laid out in any direction and have flexed dimensions which fill up the space.

  2. align-items: center; This is a sub-property of the ‘flex’ display. It vertically aligns the flex items along the cross axis of the current line. In simpler terms, it centers content vertically.

  3. justify-content: center; This property aligns the flexible container’s items when the items do not use all available space on the main-axis (horizontal axis in this case). Basically, it center aligns content horizontally.

Together, these properties will center the div’s contents both vertically and horizontally. This method provides an easy way to center multiple lines of text, and it can also handle dynamic div sizes.

Remember, when you use this technique, the parent div becomes a Flex container, and its direct children become the flex items. So, it’s ideal for scenarios when you want to center direct child elements.

With the right implementation of CSS, centering content can be a hassle-free undertaking. Get creative and enhance your designs with symmetrically centered content.

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