<div>: The Content Division element
BaselineWidely available
This feature is well established and works across many devices and browser versions. It’s been available across browsers since July 2015.
The<div>
HTML element is the generic container for flow content. It has no effect on the content or layout until styled in some way usingCSS (e.g., styling is directly applied to it, or some kind of layout model likeFlexbox is applied to its parent element).
Try it
<div> <img src="/shared-assets/images/examples/leopard.jpg" alt="An intimidating leopard." /> <p>Beware of the leopard</p></div>
.warning { border: 10px ridge #f00; background-color: #ff0; padding: 0.5rem; display: flex; flex-direction: column;}.warning img { width: 100%;}.warning p { font: small-caps bold 1.2rem sans-serif; text-align: center;}
As a "pure" container, the<div>
element does not inherently represent anything. Instead, it's used to group content so it can be easily styled using theclass
orid
attributes, marking a section of a document as being written in a different language (using thelang
attribute), and so on.
Attributes
This element includes theglobal attributes.
Note:Thealign
attribute is obsolete; do not use it anymore. Instead, you should use CSS properties or techniques such asCSS Grid orCSS Flexbox to align and position<div>
elements on the page.
Usage notes
Accessibility
The<div>
element hasan implicit role ofgeneric
, and not none. This may affect certain ARIA combination declarations that expect a direct descendant element with a certain role to function properly.
Examples
A basic example
<div> <p> Any kind of content here. Such as <p>, <table>. You name it! </p></div>
Result
A styled example
This example creates a shadowed box by applying a style to the<div>
using CSS. Note the use of theclass
attribute on the<div>
to apply the style named"shadowbox"
to the element.
HTML
<div> <p>Here's a very interesting note displayed in a lovely shadowed box.</p></div>
CSS
.shadowbox { width: 15em; border: 1px solid #333; box-shadow: 8px 8px 5px #444; padding: 8px 12px; background-image: linear-gradient(180deg, #fff, #ddd 40%, #ccc);}
Result
Technical summary
Content categories | Flow content,palpable content. |
---|---|
Permitted content | Flow content. Or (inWHATWG HTML): If the parent is a <dl> element: one or more<dt> elements followed by one or more<dd> elements, optionally intermixed with<script> and<template> elements. |
Tag omission | None, both the starting and ending tag are mandatory. |
Permitted parents | Any element that acceptsflow content. Or (inWHATWG HTML): <dl> element. |
Implicit ARIA role | generic |
Permitted ARIA roles | Any |
DOM interface | HTMLDivElement |
Specifications
Specification |
---|
HTML # the-div-element |