margin-block

The margin-block CSS shorthand property defines the logical block start and end margins of an element, which maps to physical margins depending on the element's writing mode, directionality, and text orientation.

css

margin-block: 10px 20px;
writing-mode: horizontal-tb;

css

margin-block: 20px 40px;
writing-mode: vertical-rl;

css

margin-block: 5% 20%;
writing-mode: horizontal-tb;

css

margin-block: 1rem auto;
writing-mode: vertical-lr;

html

<section id="default-example">
  <div id="container">
    <div class="row">One</div>
    <div class="row transition-all" id="example-element">Two</div>
    <div class="row">Three</div>
  </div>
</section>

css

#container {
  width: 300px;
  height: 200px;
  display: flex;
  align-content: flex-start;
  flex-direction: column;
  justify-content: flex-start;
}

.row {
  height: 33.33%;
  display: inline-block;
  border: solid #ce7777 10px;
  background-color: #2b3a55;
  color: white;
  flex-shrink: 0;
}

#example-element {
  border: solid 10px #ffbf00;
  background-color: #2b3a55;
}

Constituent properties

This property is a shorthand for the following CSS properties:

{{cssxref("margin-block-start")}}
{{cssxref("margin-block-end")}}

Syntax

css

/* <length> values */
margin-block: 10px 20px; /* An absolute length */
margin-block: 1em 2em; /* relative to the text size */
margin-block: 5% 2%; /* relative to the nearest block container's width */
margin-block: 10px; /* sets both start and end values */
margin-block: anchor-size(inline);
margin-block: calc(anchor-size(width) / 4) 1em;

/* Keyword values */
margin-block: auto;

/* Global values */
margin-block: inherit;
margin-block: initial;
margin-block: revert;
margin-block: revert-layer;
margin-block: unset;

This property corresponds to the {{CSSxRef("margin-top")}} and {{CSSxRef("margin-bottom")}}, or the {{CSSxRef("margin-right")}} and {{CSSxRef("margin-left")}} properties, depending on the values defined for {{CSSxRef("writing-mode")}}, {{CSSxRef("direction")}}, and {{CSSxRef("text-orientation")}}.

The margin-block property may be specified using one or two values.

When one value is specified, it applies the same margin to both start and end.
When two values are specified, the first margin applies to the start, the second to the end.

Values

The margin-block property takes the same values as the {{CSSxRef("margin-top", "", "#values")}} property.

Formal definition

Formal syntax

Examples

Setting block start and end margins

CSS

css

div {
  background-color: yellow;
  width: 120px;
  height: auto;
  border: 1px solid green;
}

p {
  margin: 0;
  margin-block: 20px 40px;
  background-color: tan;
}

.verticalExample {
  writing-mode: vertical-rl;
}

HTML

html

<div>
  <p>Example text</p>
</div>
<div class="verticalExample">
  <p>Example text</p>
</div>

Result

{{EmbedLiveSample("Setting_block_start_and_end_margins", 140, 200)}}