Although the primary purpose of the overflow
property is to control overflow behavior, it also has another important impact on rendering. When you set the overflow
property to anything other than visible
, a block box establishes its own block formatting context.
This feature is commonly used to contain floats without requiring a clearfix. However, the creation of a new BFC has various implications beyond float containment, which are detailed in the specification. For more insights into this behavior, refer to this extensive analysis (surprisingly, the rationale behind this behavior is not solely related to float containment; it's more of an incidental outcome).
In essence, removing the overflow
declaration could disrupt float layouts and other aspects of the design. It is advisable to retain this property unless absolutely necessary or if certain of its negligible impact on layout.