overflow-y

Baseline Widely available

This feature is well established and works across many devices and browser versions. It’s been available across browsers since ⁨July 2015⁩.

Theoverflow-yCSS property sets what shows when content overflows a block-level element's top and bottom edges. This may be nothing, a scroll bar, or the overflow content. This property may also be set by using theoverflow shorthand property.

Try it

overflow-y: visible;

overflow-y: hidden;

overflow-y: clip;

overflow-y: scroll;

overflow-y: auto;

<section>  <p>    Michaelmas term lately over, and the Lord Chancellor sitting in Lincoln's    Inn Hall. Implacable November weather. As much mud in the streets as if the    waters had but newly retired from the face of the earth.  </p></section>

#example-element {  width: 15em;  height: 9em;  border: medium dotted;  padding: 0.75em;  text-align: left;}

Syntax

css

/* Keyword values */overflow-y: visible;overflow-y: hidden;overflow-y: clip;overflow-y: scroll;overflow-y: auto;/* Global values */overflow-y: inherit;overflow-y: initial;overflow-y: revert;overflow-y: revert-layer;overflow-y: unset;

Theoverflow-y property is specified as a single<overflow> keyword value.

Ifoverflow-x ishidden,scroll, orauto and theoverflow-y property isvisible (default), the value will be implicitly computed asauto.

Values

visible: Overflow content is not clipped and may be visible outside the element's padding box at the top and bottom edges. The element box is not ascroll container.
hidden: Overflow content is clipped if necessary to fit vertically in the elements' padding box. No scroll bars are provided.
clip: Overflow content is clipped at the element'soverflow clip edge that is defined using theoverflow-clip-margin property. As a result, content overflows the element's padding box by the<length> value ofoverflow-clip-margin or by0px if not set. The difference betweenclip andhidden is that theclip keyword also forbids all scrolling, including programmatic scrolling. No new formatting context is created. To establish a formatting context, useoverflow: clip along withdisplay: flow-root. The element box is not a scroll container.
scroll: Overflow content is clipped if necessary to fit vertically inside the element's padding box. Browsers display scroll bars in the vertical direction whether or not any content is actually clipped. (This prevents scroll bars from appearing or disappearing when the content changes.) Printers may still print overflowing content.
auto: Overflow content is clipped at the element's padding box, and overflow content can be scrolled into view. Unlikescroll, user agents display scroll barsonly if the content is overflowing, hiding scroll bars by default. If content fits inside the element's padding box, it looks the same as withvisible, but still establishes a new block-formatting context.

Note:The keyword valueoverlay is a legacy value alias forauto. Withoverlay, the scroll bars are drawn on top of the content instead of taking up space.

Formal definition

Initial value	`visible`
Applies to	Block-containers, flex containers, and grid containers
Inherited	no
Computed value	as specified, except with`visible`/`clip` computing to`auto`/`hidden` respectively if one of`overflow-x` or`overflow-y` is neither`visible` nor clip
Animation type	discrete

Formal syntax

overflow-y =
visible|
hidden|
clip|
scroll|
auto

Examples

Setting overflow-y behavior

HTML

html

<ul>  <li>    <code>overflow-y:hidden</code> — hides the text outside the box    <div>      Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod      tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim      veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea      commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate      velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur.    </div>  </li>  <li>    <code>overflow-y:scroll</code> — always adds a scrollbar    <div>      Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod      tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim      veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea      commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate      velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur.    </div>  </li>  <li>    <code>overflow-y:visible</code> — displays the text outside the box if    needed    <div>      Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod      tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim      veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea      commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate      velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur.    </div>  </li>  <li>    <code>overflow-y:auto</code> — equivalent to <code>scroll</code>    on most browsers    <div>      Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod      tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim      veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea      commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate      velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur.    </div>  </li></ul>

CSS

css

div {  border: 1px solid black;  width: 250px;  height: 100px;}#div1 {  overflow-y: hidden;  margin-bottom: 12px;}#div2 {  overflow-y: scroll;  margin-bottom: 12px;}#div3 {  overflow-y: visible;  margin-bottom: 120px;}#div4 {  overflow-y: auto;  margin-bottom: 120px;}

Result

Specifications

Specification
CSS Overflow Module Level 3 # overflow-properties

Browser compatibility

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This page was last modified on⁨Jul 14, 2025⁩ byMDN contributors.

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