How to layout web pages in CSS — CSS layout Tricks

Piyush kesarwani
4 min readApr 9, 2023

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Photo by Jackson Sophat on Unsplash

Introduction to CSS Layout

CSS layout is crucial to arranging elements on a webpage. With CSS layout, you can create navigation bars, headers, grid systems for content placement, and much more. What’s great about CSS layout is that it allows you to create flexible designs that can adapt to different screen sizes without using complicated programming languages or media queries. In addition, CSS layout makes it easy to maintain your website because you can separate design from code. If you need to make changes to your site’s design later on, all you need to do is edit one file, not every single page!

Using Flexbox for CSS Layout

One of the best ways to create flexible layouts is by using Flexbox. It’s an improvement over CSS Grid and allows you to align items horizontally or vertically, change their size based on their content, and create grid-like structures without having to worry about floats or positioning elements manually. Flexbox is perfect for creating responsive designs that can adapt to different screen sizes.

Using Grid for CSS Layout

Grid is another layout system that allows you to create rows and columns of content. It’s similar to Flexbox, but it has some key differences. Grid allows you to define how many columns or rows should be in your grid, and you can specify how big each column or row should be by defining a number for the grid-template-columns property. You can use the auto value for width or height properties on an element if you want it to fill up all available space inside its parent container, making it easier when creating responsive layouts.

Using Floats for CSS Layout

Floats are useful for creating columns and multi-column layouts, as well as sidebars or any other type of element that you want to appear next to another element on the page. Floats allow you to position elements relative to other elements instead of being positioned absolutely, which makes them much easier to use than absolute positioning. You can use padding around those sections until everything looks good instead of remembering exact coordinates or dimensions.

Using Positioning for CSS Layout

Positioning is a CSS property that allows you to position elements relative to their parent container. This is useful for creating layouts and positioning elements within other elements. When using positioning, it’s essential to remember that it only works on block-level elements such as div. Non-block level tags such as span or p will not be affected by the position property. You should always specify either top/bottom values when using float layout techniques.

Using Media Queries for CSS Layout

Media queries are a powerful tool for creating responsive websites. They allow you to use CSS to control the layout of your page based on the size and resolution of the device being used. For example, you could use media queries to display an image at full width on large screens, but only half its original width on smaller screens. Media Queries have been around since CSS3, and using a third-party library like Bootstrap or Foundation can make sure your site works across all devices with minimal effort.

Using Responsiveness for CSS Layout

Responsive design is a method of creating web pages that adapt to different screen sizes. It allows you to create one website that can be viewed on any device, from desktop computers to smartphones and tablets. This can be done by using media queries in CSS to change the layout of your page based on the size of its container element. The most common way to implement responsive design is with fluid grids, which make use of percentages instead of fixed units like pixels or ems when defining dimensions for page elements such as columns and gutters.

Using Shorthand for CSS Layout

Shorthand is a way to shorten the code and make it more readable. It works by omitting some of the less important parts of the declaration, like units or values that are set to their default state. For example, h1 { color: #00FF00; } becomes h1 {color:#00FF00;}.

Using Preprocessors for CSS Layout

Preprocessors are tools that compile your code and make it more efficient. They’re great for CSS because they allow you to write code in a more expressive way, which can help reduce redundancy and make your code easier to read. Preprocessor properties are the variables that preprocessors use when compiling your code into CSS. You can define these variables at the top of your file, then use them throughout your stylesheets without having to retype them every time.

Conclusion

In conclusion, CSS layout is a powerful tool for creating web pages. It allows you to create flexible, responsive designs that can adapt to different screen sizes and resolutions. CSS layouts are easier to maintain than server-side ones because they don’t require any programming knowledge. With Flexbox, Grid, Floats, Positioning, Media Queries, Responsive Design, Shorthand, and Preprocessors, you can create beautiful layouts that are easy to read and maintain.

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Piyush kesarwani

Web Developer | Writer | Designer & Programmer. I’ll help you to become 1% better each day by sharing what I learn along the way. Level up your game with me.