The CSS margin properties are used to generate space around elements.

The margin properties set the size of the white space outside the border.

With CSS, you have full control over the margins. There are CSS properties for setting the margin for each side of an element (top, right, bottom, and left).

CSS has properties for specifying the margin for each side of an element:

• margin-top
• margin-right
• margin-bottom
• margin-left

All the margin properties can have the following values:

• auto - the browser calculates the margin
• length - specifies a margin in px, pt, cm, etc.
• % - specifies a margin in % of the width of the containing element
• inherit - specifies that the margin should be inherited from the parent element

Tip: Negative values are allowed.

The following example sets different margins for all four sides of a <p> element:

To shorten the code, it is possible to specify all the margin properties in one property.

The margin property is a shorthand property for the following individual margin properties:

• margin-top
• margin-right
• margin-bottom
• margin-left

You can set the margin property to auto to horizontally center the element within its container.

The element will then take up the specified width, and the remaining space will be split equally between the left and right margins:

The background image for a page can be set like this:

This example lets the left margin be inherited from the parent element:

Top and bottom margins of elements are sometimes collapsed into a single margin that is equal to the largest of the two margins.

This does not happen on horizontal margins (left and right)! Only vertical margins (top and bottom)!

Look at the following example:

In the example above, the <h1> element has a bottom margin of 50px. The <h2> element has a top margin set to 20px.

Common sense would seem to suggest that the vertical margin between the <h1> and the <h2> would be a total of 70px (50px + 20px). But due to margin collapse, the actual margin ends up being 50px.