CODEWITHSUNDEEP
htmlcss
Steve Barna
Steve Barna

Reputation: 1398

What is the difference between inline-block and inline-table?

As far as I can tell, these display selectors seem to be identical.

From the Mozilla CSS documentation:

inline-table: The inline-table value does not have a direct mapping in HTML. It behaves like a <table> HTML element, but as an inline box, rather than a block-level box. Inside the table box is a block-level context.

inline-block: The element generates a block element box that will be flowed with surrounding content as if it were a single inline box (behaving much like a replaced element would).

It seems that whatever could be done with inline-table can be done with inline-block.

Upvotes: 65

Views: 99380

Answers (3)

j.j.
j.j.

Reputation: 2100

Here are relevant differences in practice. Run the code snippet to see it at first glance.

  • Vertical alignment of surrounding text (test 1, 2, 3, 4):
    inline-table elements align with its top cell or top baseline (if content is only multiple lines of text).
    Text around inline-box aligns with its bottom.
  • inline-table works table-like, e.g. see differences:
    • test 5 and 6 for height
    • test 7, 8, 9, 10 for width and overflow

<style>
     span, table { background: silver }
     th, td { background: gold }
</style>

...1.
     <span style=display:inline-block> 
       display <br> inline <br> block
     </span>
...2.
     <span style=display:inline-table>
       display <br> inline <br> table
     </span>
...3.
     <table style=display:inline-block>
       <tr><th> inline
       <tr><td> block
     </table>
...4.
     <table style=display:inline-table>
       <tr><th> inline
       <tr><td> table
     </table>
...5.
     <table style=display:inline-block;height:5em>
       <tr><th> inline
       <tr><td> block
     </table>
...6.
     <table style=display:inline-table;height:5em>
       <tr><th> inline
       <tr><td> table
     </table>...<br>
...7.
     <span style=display:inline-block;width:1.4em>
       block
     </span>
...8.
     <span style=display:inline-table;width:1.4em>
       table
     </span>
...9.
     <table style=display:inline-block;width:1.4em>
       <tr><th> inline
       <tr><td> block
     </table>
...10.
     <table style=display:inline-table;width:1.4em>
       <tr><th> inline
       <tr><td> table
     </table>
...11.
     <table style=display:inline-block;width:5em>
       <tr><th> inline
       <tr><td> block
     </table>
...12.
     <table style=display:inline-table;width:5em>
       <tr><th> inline
       <tr><td> table
     </table>..

Upvotes: 5

Quantico
Quantico

Reputation: 2446

display:table will make your tag behave like a table. inline-table just means that the element is displayed as an inline-level table. You can then do table-cell to let your element behave like a <td> element.

display:inline - displays your element as an inline element (like <span>), and inline-block will just group them together in a block container.

As the other answer suggested you can replace between the two as long as you follow the display convention in the rest of your code. (i.e. use table-cell with inline-table and not with inline-block).
Check this link for more info on display.

Upvotes: 26

Oriol
Oriol

Reputation: 288680

Both inline-block and inline-table have an inline outer display role. That means

The element generates an inline-level box.

The difference is that

However, in most cases, inline-table will behave like inline-block because of anonymous table objects:

Generate missing child wrappers:

  • If a child C of a 'table' or 'inline-table' box is not a proper table child, then generate an anonymous 'table-row' box around C and all consecutive siblings of C that are not proper table children.
  • If a child C of a 'table-row' box is not a 'table-cell', then generate an anonymous 'table-cell' box around C and all consecutive siblings of C that are not 'table-cell' boxes.

Therefore, if your inline-table element has non-tabular content, that content will be wrapped in an anonymous table-cell.

And table-cell has a flow-root inner display model, just like inline-block.

But if the inline-table has tabular content, it will behave differently than inline-block.

Some examples:

  • Inside an inline-block, cells with non-tabular separator will generate different table anonymous parents, so they will appear at different lines. Inside an inline-table, it will be the separator who will generate a table-cell parent, so they all will appear at the same row.

    .itable {
  display: inline-table;
}
.iblock {
  display: inline-block;
}
.cell {
  display: table-cell;
}
.wrapper > span {
  border: 1px solid #000;
  padding: 5px;
}
    <fieldset>
  <legend>inline-table</legend>
  <div class="itable wrapper">
    <span class="cell">table-cell</span>
    <span class="iblock">inline-block</span>
    <span class="cell">table-cell</span>
  </div>
</fieldset>
<fieldset>
  <legend>inline-block</legend>
  <div class="iblock wrapper">
    <span class="cell">table-cell</span>
    <span class="iblock">inline-block</span>
    <span class="cell">table-cell</span>
  </div>
</fieldset>

  • Inner cells won't grow to fill a wide inline-block:

    .itable {
  display: inline-table;
}
.iblock {
  display: inline-block;
}
.wrapper {
  width: 100%;
}
.cell {
  display: table-cell;
  border: 1px solid #000;
}
    <fieldset>
  <legend>inline-table</legend>
  <div class="itable wrapper">
    <span class="cell">table-cell</span>
  </div>
</fieldset>
<fieldset>
  <legend>inline-block</legend>
  <div class="iblock wrapper">
    <span class="cell">table-cell</span>
  </div>
</fieldset>

  • The border of the inline-block won't collapse with the border of the inner cells:

    .wrapper, .cell {
  border-collapse: collapse;
  border: 5px solid #000;
}
.itable {
  display: inline-table;
}
.iblock {
  display: inline-block;
}
.cell {
  display: table-cell;
}
    <fieldset>
  <legend>inline-table</legend>
  <div class="itable wrapper">
    <span class="cell">table-cell</span>
    <span class="cell">table-cell</span>
  </div>
</fieldset>
<fieldset>
  <legend>inline-block</legend>
  <div class="iblock wrapper">
    <span class="cell">table-cell</span>
    <span class="cell">table-cell</span>
  </div>
</fieldset>

Upvotes: 92

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