Typical display: flow-root; use case

Good display: flow-root; use case by Paul Bakaus:

flow-root establishes a new block formatting context, but most have dismissed it as simply replacing clearfix hacks. But consider this extremely common case, where you have a few paragraphs of text, some bullet points and a floating image.

In the image above you can see that the <ul>‘s bounding box appears behind the floated element, thus rendering the list bullets above/behind said image.

The fix is to create a new block formatting context, which is exactly what display: flow-root; affords.

💁‍♂️ What is this “new block formatting context” exactly? As per spec:

The bounding box of an element in the normal flow that establishes a new block formatting context (such as an element with ‘overflow’ other than ‘visible’) must not overlap any floats in the same block formatting context as the element itself.

In the past, one would’ve used overflow: hidden; to achieve the same result.

Check out this Pen!

However, as browser support for display: flow-root; is still lacking (Firefox 53, Opera 45, and Chrome 58 are the only browsers that support it) we’ll have to stick to the overflow: hidden; method for a little while longer …

Block formatting contexts and lists →

Published by Bramus!

Bramus is a frontend web developer from Belgium, working as a Chrome Developer Relations Engineer at Google. From the moment he discovered view-source at the age of 14 (way back in 1997), he fell in love with the web and has been tinkering with it ever since (more …)

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