Ojambo CSS Sticky Footer

CSS Sticky Footer

Keep Footer On Bottom

Several methods exist for keeping the footer content on the bottom. Some use JavaScript or server-side programming. CSS can be used to position the footer on the bottom.

All methods for keeping the footer on the bottom need to know the specific height of the page. CSS can utilize absolute positioning, but a simpler method exists using negative margins.

This tutorial uses the HTML and CSS height function. The CSS height property is used to keep the footer on the bottom.

Text editor.
HTML.
CSS.

Browser to view output.

Optional Download and install suitable text editor

Any text editor with regular expression support will work. To select a reviewed lightweight programming editor read the Ojambo.com Lightweight Programming Editors.

CSS-Sticky-Footer.html file

<!--
  CSS-Sticky-Footer.html.html
  
  Copyright 2011 Edward <http://ojambo.com>
  
  This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
  it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
  the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
  (at your option) any later version.
  
  This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
  but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
  MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
  GNU General Public License for more details.
  
  You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
  along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
  Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston,
  MA 02110-1301, USA.
        
        
-->

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
	"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en">

<head>
	<title>Ojambo.com Sticky Footer Demo</title>
	<style type="text/css">
		html, body { height: 100%; }
		div#main-content { height: 100%; margin-bottom:-70px;}
		div#footer {height: 70px; }
	</style>
</head>

<body>
	<div id="main-content">
		<h1>Ojambo.com Sticky Footer Demo</h1>
	</div>
	<div class="footer">
		<h2>Footer Stays On Bottom</h2>
	</div>	
</body>

</html>

The CSS used an internal style sheet inside the head tags. The body and the main content have heights of 100%. Use the footer height as the margin-bottom negative height.

How to Use:

Run the CSS-Change-Text.html file in your favourite browser.
Hover over the text to see the new (hidden) text.

Demonstration:

Ojambo.com CSS Sticky Footer Tutorial

Image Missing — Ojambo.com CSS Sticky Footer Tutorial

Conclusion:

CSS can be used to position the footer on the bottom of the page. The body of the page and the main content must have the same height. It works by giving the main content a negative vertical margin that equals the footer height.

Use CSS to eliminate the need to run server-side code.
Use CSS to eliminate the need to run JavaScript code.
Do not assume users want or have enable JavaScript.

Tags: Absolute, Bottom, CSS, Footer, Height, html, Position, Sticky, Vertical

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 26th, 2011 at 12:00 am and is filed under Tips & Tricks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.