Creating a CSS auto center for elements, with a unique twist

I have a design layout like this: Click here to view the image

My auto-centered content is styled with the following CSS:

width: 960px;
margin: 0px auto;

Within this auto-centered content, there is a DIV element that needs to span the full width of the browser.

What would be the best approach to create a 100% width DIV in this scenario?

Using

position: absolute /* or fixed */
is not ideal for me because the height of the content above the 100%-DIV varies.

Answer №1

Check out this sample Code:

<html>
<head>
<title>Shapes</title>

<style type="text/css>
<!--

container {
    margin: 0;
    padding: 0;
}
* {
    margin: 0;
    padding: 0;
}

#box {
    width: 100%;
    margin: 0 auto;
}
#box div.width_1080 {
    width: 1080px;
    margin: 0 auto;
    border-left: 2px #000 solid;
    border-right: 2px #000 solid;
}
#box div.width_full {
    width: 100%;
    background: #000;
}   

-->
</style>
</head>
<body>

<div id="box">
    <div class="width_960">
        <p>example</p>
        <p>example</p>
        <p>example</p>
        <p>example</p>
        <p>example</p>
    </div>
    <div class="width_full">
        <p>full example</p>
        <p>full example</p>
    </div>
    <div class="width_960">
        <p>example</p>
        <p>example</p>
        <p>example</p>
        <p>example</p>
        <p>example</p>
    </div>
</div>

</body>
</html>

Answer №2

When setting a width in CSS, it's important to note that you may lose the information of the parent's width.

In simple terms, it isn't possible to reset a div within a constrained div to match the window's width using only CSS. However, with JavaScript and under the condition that the parent doesn't have overflow:hidden, you could implement the following steps:

  • Adjust the child's width to equal window.innerWidth
  • Set the left and right margin of the child to -(window.innerWidth/2 - parentDivs_width)

For instance, if the window size is 800px:

#parent {
  width: 300px;
  margin: 0 auto;
}

#child {
  /* These values need to be set with JavaScript */
  width: 800px;
  margin: 0 -250px;
}

An alternative solution would be to remove the child div from its parent, position them both with negative top and bottom margins. (Note that using position:absolute wouldn't solve this issue as it results in losing width information.)

Answer №3

An element cannot be wider than its parent by default. To achieve this, you need to remove it from the normal document flow. Using position:absolute solves this issue by allowing the element to take up 100% of the width without affecting the flow, as long as the top position is not specified.

position:absolute;
width:100%;
left:0px;

Answer №4

Here is a sneaky little workaround that doesn't require any Javascript: click here to see it.

The trick involves creating a separate background element that is absolutely positioned and covers the entire window.

UPDATE: Now improved to handle multiple lines of content.

div.FullWidth {
  position:relative;
}
div.FullWidth .Background{
  position: absolute;
  left:-2048px;
  z-index:-1;
  width: 4096px;
  height:100%;

  background:#999;
}
div.FullWidth .Content {
  text-align: center;
  font-size:larger;
  color: red;
}



<div class="FullWidth">
  <div class="Background">&nbsp;</div>
  <div class="Content">
    Hello!</div>
</div>

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