Flexbox is a technique in CSS that makes the design of web pages much simpler and more efficient. This tool allows designers to create complex and adaptable layouts more easily and with greater effectiveness. While previously, float and positioning were used for layout, Flexbox has eliminated the need for these old and cumbersome techniques.
One of the greatest advantages of Flexbox is its ability to create layouts that automatically adjust according to the size of the display window; this means that you can create responsive and flexible layouts. Also, with Flexbox, you can easily center elements within a container or between available spaces.
Getting started with Flexbox is simple: it requires defining a Flex container. By using the display: flex; directive, you can indicate that its children should be structured based on the rules of Flexbox. Some common properties used in Flexbox include justify-content, align-items, and flex-direction.
Another powerful feature of Flexbox is flex-wrap. This property allows you to automatically move the items of a container onto new lines when there is not enough space for display in a single line. With all these capabilities, Flexbox can greatly simplify many layout needs.
To understand better, let’s take a look at a simple Flexbox example:
<div class="container">
<div class="item">1</div>
<div class="item">2</div>
<div class="item">3</div>
</div>
.container {
display: flex;
flex-direction: row;
justify-content: space-between;
align-items: center;
}
.item {
flex: 1;
}
In this example, we have a container with three items. By using display: flex; on the container, the items inside it are presented in a row.
flex-direction: row;
This line places the items horizontally.
justify-content: space-between;
This aligns the items evenly in the container with equal space between them.
align-items: center;
This centers the items vertically inside the container.
flex: 1;
Each item takes up equal space in the container.