CSS how to position an element in a middle (half height / vertical 50%) of another element

Question

I'm looking forward to build a tooltip which is positioned next to the element, but in a middle of it. It's easy to put it over and under and position it in the horizontal center of an element. But is there a way to do so vertically (on the right or left side of an element, vertically positioned in a middle of that element height)?

For my purpose, height of the element is fixed (known) & height of tooltip is not, because it can contain various text content. And a tooltip can be a child of element.

However, I'm also curious about, how to do it when both heights are not fixed (unknown and can vary depending on content). By heights I understand element's and tooltip's height. Width can be known and fixed.

Solution 1

This is pretty late but I tried to make an example on codepen which shows a working example if I understood your question correctly.

http://codepen.io/trgraglia/pen/RWbKyj

Use CSS transform.

For example, transform:translateX(-50%);, will move an element left by 50% of ITSELF. Now you can align it to the parent with position and bottom or top or left or right and then move it by the dimensions of itself.

Hope this helps!

Solution 2

using CSS & jQuery-

CSS

.div{
    top:50%
}

jQuery

var divheight = $(.div).height() / 2;
$(.div).attr('style','margin-top:-'+divheight+'px;');

Solution 3

If you don't know both heights, there are only two ways:

1. Set the parent display: table and children display: table-cell and vertical-align: middle.
2. Using CSS3 Flexbox: http://www.w3.org/TR/css3-flexbox/ but with limited browser support: http://caniuse.com/#search=flexbox

If you are interested in this topic, here there is a good article with more tips: http://www.vanseodesign.com/css/vertical-centering/

As you can see, the only way to vertical align an element without knowing its height and nor using CSS3 is using display: table-cell.

Solution 4

If you know the height of the content the easiest way to center the tooltip is to set the line-height of tooltip to the height of content.You can see how i did that here jsFiddle

View more solutions

Comments

[Anthony Graglia]

Not sure where the downvote comes from. Maybe i wasn't clear in my example. Top for example uses the parent height. You can set 50% top on the tooltip and then translateY -50% to center it. Feel free to explain the downvote.

[elon]

Question was all about CSS only solution.

[ggdx]

@elon - and nearly three years ago. Busy evening?

[Randy]

This transform property rocks! In modern browsers the support for this CSS tag is pretty good, check your browser support though if you are going to use this (old IE doesn't work... same old story)

[Khateeb321]

For me, this is the best solution.

[Raymond Naseef]

Please do me a favor and put link to this SO question into your Pen, so I can find the question from bookmark to your pen. Thanks.

[Anthony Graglia]

@RaymondNaseef Done. Thanks for the suggestion.