Unusual padding anomaly seen with inline elements (bottom padding is applied correctly, while top padding is not)

Question

Unusual padding anomaly seen with inline elements (bottom padding is applied correctly, while top padding is not)

I had a good understanding of how inline elements function. But I came across a helpful explanation here: CSS display: inline vs inline-block.

Regarding inline elements:

respect left & right margins and padding, but not top & bottom

Inline elements only acknowledge right and left padding, disregarding any padding specified for top and bottom. However, my recent tests revealed an unusual behavior. When applying padding to an inline element, it seems to apply it to the left, right, and bottom but not the top.

Can anyone provide an explanation for this particular behavior?

<html>
    <head>
        <style>
            * {
                box-sizing: border-box;
                padding:0;
                margin:0;
            }
            .parent{
                display:inline;
                background-color: red;
                padding: 10rem;
                color:white;
            }
        </style>
    </head>
    <body>
        <div class="parent">Whatever</div>
    </body>
</html>

html css padding

Answer 1

Answer №1

Utilize the inspect element feature in your browser to observe that there is a padding-top of 10em present, which may not be visible in the snippet provided.

The rationale behind this: Even though there is padding for inline elements, it does not impact the space above and below it - the line (i.e. baseline for the text) remains at the same vertical position with or without the padding. The padding simply generates an overflowing area that only becomes evident if a background color is defined.

Refer to my code snippet where I introduced a wrapper with a 12em padding-top, along with some text before and after the inline div, as well as preceding and following the wrapper div to illustrate the behavior explained.

* {
  box-sizing: border-box;
  padding: 0;
  margin: 0;
}

.wrap1 {
  padding-top: 12em;
  background: green;
  /* display: block; is the default here */
}

.parent {
  display: inline;
  background-color: red;
  padding: 10rem;
  color: white;
}

.y {
  background: rgba(255, 255, 0, 0.4);
  border-radius: 50%;
  padding: 0.6em 0.15em 0.6em 0.1em;
}

<body>
  <div>This is in a separate div which preceds the inline div and its wrapper.</div>
  <div class="wrap1">
    this is on the same the line
    <div class="parent">Whatever</div> yes it is
  </div>
  <div>And this is in a separate div following the inline div and its wrapper.</div>
  <p>And here is another line with one (inline) <span class="y">word</span> that has a padding in a way that <em>might</em> be considered useful.</p>
</body>

Answer 2

Utilize the inspect element feature in your browser to observe that there is a padding-top of 10em present, which may not be visible in the snippet provided.

The rationale behind this: Even though there is padding for inline elements, it does not impact the space above and below it - the line (i.e. baseline for the text) remains at the same vertical position with or without the padding. The padding simply generates an overflowing area that only becomes evident if a background color is defined.

Refer to my code snippet where I introduced a wrapper with a 12em padding-top, along with some text before and after the inline div, as well as preceding and following the wrapper div to illustrate the behavior explained.

* {
  box-sizing: border-box;
  padding: 0;
  margin: 0;
}

.wrap1 {
  padding-top: 12em;
  background: green;
  /* display: block; is the default here */
}

.parent {
  display: inline;
  background-color: red;
  padding: 10rem;
  color: white;
}

.y {
  background: rgba(255, 255, 0, 0.4);
  border-radius: 50%;
  padding: 0.6em 0.15em 0.6em 0.1em;
}

<body>
  <div>This is in a separate div which preceds the inline div and its wrapper.</div>
  <div class="wrap1">
    this is on the same the line
    <div class="parent">Whatever</div> yes it is
  </div>
  <div>And this is in a separate div following the inline div and its wrapper.</div>
  <p>And here is another line with one (inline) <span class="y">word</span> that has a padding in a way that <em>might</em> be considered useful.</p>
</body>

Unusual padding anomaly seen with inline elements (bottom padding is applied correctly, while top padding is not)

Answer №1

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