1. Introduction
This section is not normative.
A selector is a boolean predicate that takes an element in a tree structure and tests whether the element matches the selector or not.
These expressions may be used for many things:
- directly on an element to test whether it matches some criteria,
such as in the
element.matches()
function defined in [DOM] - applied to an entire tree of elements
to filter it into a set of elements that match the criteria,
such as in the
document.queryAll()
function defined in [DOM] or the selector of a CSS style rule. - used "in reverse" to generate markup that would match a given selector, such as in HAML or Emmet.
Selectors Levels 1, 2, and 3 are defined as the subsets of selector functionality defined in the CSS1, CSS2.1, and Selectors Level 3 specifications, respectively. This module defines Selectors Level 4.
1.1. Module Interactions
This module replaces the definitions of and extends the set of selectors defined for CSS in [SELECT] and [CSS21].
Pseudo-element selectors, which define abstract elements in a rendering tree, are not part of this specification: their generic syntax is described here, but, due to their close integration with the rendering model and irrelevance to other uses such as DOM queries, they will be defined in other modules.
2. Selectors Overview
This section is non-normative, as it merely summarizes the following sections.
A selector represents a structure. This structure can be used as a condition (e.g. in a CSS rule) that determines which elements a selector matches in the document tree, or as a flat description of the HTML or XML fragment corresponding to that structure.
Selectors may range from simple element names to rich contextual representations.
The following table summarizes the Selector syntax:
| Pattern | Represents | Section | Level |
|---|---|---|---|
*
| any element | §5.2 Universal selector | 2 |
E
| an element of type E | §5.1 Type (tag name) selector | 1 |
E:not(s1, s2)
| an E element that does not match either compound selector s1 or compound selector s2 | §4.3 The Negation Pseudo-class: :not() | 3/4 |
E:matches(s1, s2)
| an E element that matches compound selector s1 and/or compound selector s2 | §4.2 The Matches-any Pseudo-class: :matches() | 4 |
E:something(s1, s2)
| an E element that matches compound selector s1 and/or compound selector s2 but contributes no specificity. | §4.4 The Specificity-adjustment Pseudo-class: :something() | 4 |
E:has(rs1, rs2)
| an E element, if either of the relative selectors rs1 or rs2, when evaluated with E as the :scope elements, match an element | §4.5 The Relational Pseudo-class: :has() | 4 |
E.warning
| an E element belonging to the class warning (the document language specifies how class is determined).
| §6.6 Class selectors | 1 |
E#myid
| an E element with ID equal to myid .
| §6.7 ID selectors | 1 |
E[foo]
| an E element with a foo attribute
| §6 Attribute selectors | 2 |
E[foo="bar"]
| an E element whose foo attribute value is
exactly equal to bar
| §6 Attribute selectors | 2 |
E[foo="bar" i]
| an E element whose foo attribute value is
exactly equal to any (ASCII-range) case-permutation of bar
| §6.3 Case-sensitivity | 4 |
E[foo~="bar"]
| an E element whose foo attribute value is
a list of whitespace-separated values, one of which is
exactly equal to bar
| §6 Attribute selectors | 2 |
E[foo^="bar"]
| an E element whose foo attribute value
begins exactly with the string bar
| §6.2 Substring matching attribute selectors | 3 |
E[foo$="bar"]
| an E element whose foo attribute value
ends exactly with the string bar
| §6.2 Substring matching attribute selectors | 3 |
E[foo*="bar"]
| an E element whose foo attribute value
contains the substring bar
| §6.2 Substring matching attribute selectors | 3 |
E[foo|="en"]
| an E element whose foo attribute value is
a hyphen-separated list of values beginning with en
| §6 Attribute selectors | 2 |
E:dir(ltr)
| an element of type E in with left-to-right directionality (the document language specifies how directionality is determined) | §7.1 The Directionality Pseudo-class: :dir() | 4 |
E:lang(zh, "*-hant")
| an element of type E tagged as being either in Chinese (any dialect or writing system) or otherwise written with traditional Chinese characters | §7.2 The Language Pseudo-class: :lang() | 2/4 |
E:any-link
| an E element being the source anchor of a hyperlink | §8.1 The Hyperlink Pseudo-class: :any-link | 4 |
E:link
| an E element being the source anchor of a hyperlink of which the target is not yet visited | §8.2 The Link History Pseudo-classes: :link and :visited | 1 |
E:visited
| an E element being the source anchor of a hyperlink of which the target is already visited | §8.2 The Link History Pseudo-classes: :link and :visited | 1 |
E:local-link
| an E element being the source anchor of a hyperlink targetting the current URL | §8.3 The Local Link Pseudo-class: :local-link | 4 |
E:target
| an E element being the target of the current URL | §8.4 The Target Pseudo-class: :target | 3 |
E:target-within
| an E element that is the target of the current URL or contains an element that does. | §8.5 The Target Container Pseudo-class: :target-within | 4 |
E:scope
| an E element being a designated reference element | §8.6 The Reference Element Pseudo-class: :scope | 4 |
E:current
| an E element that is currently presented in a time-dimensional canvas | §10 Time-dimensional Pseudo-classes | 4 |
E:current(s)
| an E element that is the deepest :current element that matches selector s | §10 Time-dimensional Pseudo-classes | 4 |
E:past
| an E element that is in the past in a time-dimensional canvas | §10 Time-dimensional Pseudo-classes | 4 |
E:future
| an E element that is in the future in a time-dimensional canvas | §10 Time-dimensional Pseudo-classes | 4 |
E:active
| an E element that is in an activated state | §9 User Action Pseudo-classes | 1 |
E:hover
| an E element that is under the cursor, or that has a descendant under the cursor | §9 User Action Pseudo-classes | 2 |
E:focus
| an E element that has user input focus | §9 User Action Pseudo-classes | 2 |
E:focus-within
| an E element that has user input focus or contains an element that has input focus. | §9.5 The Focus Container Pseudo-class: :focus-within | 4 |
E:focus-visible
| an E element that has user input focus, and the UA has determined that a focus ring or other indicator should be drawn for that element | §9 User Action Pseudo-classes | 4 |
E:drop
| an E element that can possibly receive a drop | §9.6 The Drop Target Pseudo-class: :drop and :drop() | 4 |
E:drop(active)
| an E element that is the current drop target for the item being dragged | §9.6 The Drop Target Pseudo-class: :drop and :drop() | 4 |
E:drop(valid)
| an E element that could receive the item currently being dragged | §9.6 The Drop Target Pseudo-class: :drop and :drop() | 4 |
E:drop(invalid)
| an E element that cannot receive the item currently being dragged, but could receive some other item | §9.6 The Drop Target Pseudo-class: :drop and :drop() | 4 |
E:enabled
| a user interface element E that is enabled or disabled, respectively | §12.1.1 The :enabled and :disabled Pseudo-classes | 3 |
E:read-write E:read-only
| a user interface element E that is user alterable, or not | §12.1.2 The Mutability Pseudo-classes: :read-only and :read-write | 3-UI/4 |
E:placeholder-shown
| an input control currently showing placeholder text | §12.1.2 The Mutability Pseudo-classes: :read-only and :read-write | 3-UI/4 |
E:default
| a user interface element E that is the default item in a group of related choices | §12.1.4 The Default-option Pseudo-class: :default | 3-UI/4 |
E:checked
| a user interface element E that is checked/selected (for instance a radio-button or checkbox) | §12.2.1 The Selected-option Pseudo-class: :checked | 3 |
E:indeterminate
| a user interface element E that is in an indeterminate state (neither checked nor unchecked) | §12.2.2 The Indeterminate-value Pseudo-class: :indeterminate | 4 |
E:valid E:invalid
| a user-input element E that meets, or doesn’t, its data validity semantics | §12.3.2 The Range Pseudo-classes: :in-range and :out-of-range | 3-UI/4 |
E:in-range E:out-of-range
| a user-input element E whose value is in-range/out-of-range | §12.3.2 The Range Pseudo-classes: :in-range and :out-of-range | 3-UI/4 |
E:required E:optional
| a user-input element E that requires/does not require input | §12.3.3 The Optionality Pseudo-classes: :required and :optional | 3-UI/4 |
E:user-invalid
| a user-altered user-input element E with incorrect input (invalid, out-of-range, omitted-but-required) | §12.3.4 The User-interaction Pseudo-class: :user-invalid | 4 |
E:root
| an E element, root of the document | §13 Tree-Structural pseudo-classes | 3 |
E:empty
| an E element that has no children (not even text nodes) | §13 Tree-Structural pseudo-classes | 3 |
E:blank
| an E element that has no content except maybe white space | §13 Tree-Structural pseudo-classes | 4 |
E:nth-child(n [of S]?)
| an E element, the n-th child of its parent matching S | §13.4 Child-indexed Pseudo-classes | 3/4 |
E:nth-last-child(n [of S]?)
| an E element, the n-th child of its parent matching S, counting from the last one | §13.4 Child-indexed Pseudo-classes | 3/4 |
E:first-child
| an E element, first child of its parent | §13.4 Child-indexed Pseudo-classes | 2 |
E:last-child
| an E element, last child of its parent | §13.4 Child-indexed Pseudo-classes | 3 |
E:only-child
| an E element, only child of its parent | §13.4 Child-indexed Pseudo-classes | 3 |
E:nth-of-type(n)
| an E element, the n-th sibling of its type | §13.5 Typed Child-indexed Pseudo-classes | 3 |
E:nth-last-of-type(n)
| an E element, the n-th sibling of its type, counting from the last one | §13.5 Typed Child-indexed Pseudo-classes | 3 |
E:first-of-type
| an E element, first sibling of its type | §13.5 Typed Child-indexed Pseudo-classes | 3 |
E:last-of-type
| an E element, last sibling of its type | §13.5 Typed Child-indexed Pseudo-classes | 3 |
E:only-of-type
| an E element, only sibling of its type | §13.5 Typed Child-indexed Pseudo-classes | 3 |
E F
| an F element descendant of an E element | §14.1 Descendant combinator ( ) | 1 |
E > F
| an F element child of an E element | §14.2 Child combinator (>) | 2 |
E + F
| an F element immediately preceded by an E element | §14.3 Next-sibling combinator (+) | 2 |
E ~ F
| an F element preceded by an E element | §14.4 Subsequent-sibling combinator (~) | 3 |
F || E
| an E element that represents a cell in a grid/table belonging to a column represented by an element F | §15 Grid-Structural Selectors | 4 |
E:nth-col(n)
| an E element that represents a cell belonging to the nth column in a grid/table | §15 Grid-Structural Selectors | 4 |
E:nth-last-col(n)
| an E element that represents a cell belonging to the nth column in a grid/table, counting from the last one | §15 Grid-Structural Selectors | 4 |
Note: Some Level 4 selectors (noted above as "3-UI") were introduced in [CSS3UI].
2.1. Live vs Snapshot Selector Profiles
Selectors are used in many different contexts, with wildly varying performance characteristics. Some powerful selectors are unfortunately too slow to realistically include in the more performance-sensitive contexts. To accommodate this, two profiles of the Selectors spec are defined:
- live profile
-
The live profile is appropriate for use in any context,
including browser CSS selector matching, which is live.
It includes every selector defined in this document,
except for:
- The :has() pseudo-class
- snapshot profile
- The snapshot profile is appropriate for contexts which aren’t extremely performance sensitive;
in particular, it’s appropriate for contexts which evaluate selectors against a static document tree.
For example, the
query()
method defined in [DOM] should use the snapshot profile. It includes all of the selectors defined in this document.
CSS implementations conformant to Selectors Level 4 must use the live profile for CSS selection. Implementations using the live profile must treat selectors that are not included in the profile as unknown and invalid.
The categorization of things into the “live” or snapshot profiles needs implementor review. If some things currently not in the live profile can reasonably be done in CSS Selectors, we should move them.
3. Selector Syntax and Structure
3.1. Structure and Terminology
A selector represents a particular pattern of element(s) in a tree structure. The term selector can refer to a simple selector, compound selector, complex selector, or selector list. The subject of a selector is any element that selector is defined to be about; that is, any element matching that selector.
A simple selector is a single condition on an element. A type selector, universal selector, attribute selector, class selector, ID selector, or pseudo-class is a simple selector. (It is represented by <simple-selector> in the selectors grammar.) A given element is said to match a simple selector when that simple selector, as defined in this specification and in accordance with the document language, accurately describes the element.
A compound selector is a sequence of simple selectors that are not separated by a combinator, and represents a set of simultaneous conditions on a single element. If it contains a type selector or universal selector, that selector must come first in the sequence. Only one type selector or universal selector is allowed in the sequence. (A compound selector is represented by <compound-selector> in the selectors grammar.) A given element is said to match a compound selector when it matches all simple selectors in the compound selector.
Note: As whitespace represents the descendant combinator, no whitespace is allowed between the simple selectors in a compound selector.
A combinator is a condition of relationship between two elements
represented by the compound selectors on either side.
Combinators in Selectors Level 4 include:
the descendant combinator (white space),
the child combinator (U+003E, >
),
the next-sibling combinator (U+002B, +
),
and the subsequent-sibling combinator (U+007E, ~
).
Two given elements are said to match a combinator when the condition of relationship between these elements is true.
A complex selector is a sequence of one or more compound selectors separated by combinators. It represents a set of simultaneous conditions on a set of elements in the particular relationships described by its combinators. (Complex selectors are represented by <complex-selector> in the selectors grammar.) A given element is said to match a complex selector when there exists a list of elements, each matching a corresponding compound selector in the complex selector, with their relationships matching the combinators between them, and with the given element matching the last compound selector.
Note: Thus, a selector consisting of a single compound selector matches any element satisfying the requirements of its constituent simple selectors. Prepending another compound selector and a combinator to a sequence imposes additional matching constraints, such that the subjects of a complex selector are always a subset of the elements represented by its last compound selector.
A list of simple/compound/complex selectors is a comma-separated list of simple, compound, or complex selectors. This is also called just a selector list when the type is either unimportant or specified in the surrounding prose; if the type is important and unspecified, it defaults to meaning a list of complex selectors. (See §4.1 Selector Lists for additional information on selector lists and the various <*-selector-list> productions in the grammar for their formal syntax.) A given element is said to match a selector list when it matches any (at least one) of the selectors in that selector list.
Pseudo-elements aren’t handled here, and should be.
3.2. Data Model
Selectors are evaluated against an element tree such as the DOM. [DOM] Within this specification, this may be referred to as the "document tree" or "source document".
Each element may have any of the following five aspects, which can be selected against, all of which are matched as strings:
- The element’s type (also known as its tag name).
- The element’s namespace.
- An ID.
- Classes (named groups) to which it belongs.
- Attributes, which are name-value pairs.
While individual elements may lack any of the above features, some elements are featureless. A featureless element does not match any selector at all, except those it is explicitly defined to match. If a given selector is allowed to match a featureless element, it must do so while ignoring the default namespace. [CSS3NAMESPACE]
Many of the selectors depend on the semantics of the document language (i.e. the language and semantics of the document tree) and/or the semantics of the host language (i.e. the language that is using selectors syntax). For example, the :lang() selector depends on the document language (e.g. HTML) to define how an element is associated with a language. As a slightly different example, the ::first-line pseudo-element depends on the host language (e.g. CSS) to define what a ::first-line pseudo-element represents and what it can do.
3.3. Scoped Selectors
Some host applications may choose to scope selectors to a particular subtree or fragment of the document. The root of the scoping subtree is called the scoping root, and may be either a true element (the scoping element) or a virtual one (such as a DocumentFragment).
When a selector is scoped, it matches an element only if the element is a descendant of the scoping root. (The rest of the selector can match unrestricted; it’s only the final matched elements that must be within the scope.)
element.querySelector()
function defined in [DOM] allows the author to evaluate a scoped selector
relative to the element
it’s called on.
A call like widget.querySelector("a")
will thus only find a
elements inside of the widget
element,
ignoring any other a
s that might be scattered throughout the document.
Note: If the context does not explicitly define any :scope elements for the selector, the scoping root is a :scope element.
3.4. Relative Selectors
Certain contexts may accept relative selectors, which are a shorthand for selectors that represent elements relative to a :scope element (i.e. an element that matches :scope). In a relative selector, “:scope ” (the :scope pseudo-class followed by a space) is implied at the beginning of each complex selector that does not already contain the :scope pseudo-class. This allows the selector to begin syntactically with a combinator. However, it must be absolutized before matching.
Relative selectors, once absolutized, can additionally be scoped.
Relative selectors are represented by <relative-selector> in the selectors grammar.
3.4.1. Absolutizing a Relative Selector
To absolutize a relative selector:
If there are no :scope elements and the selector is scoped to a virtual scoping root:
Otherwise:
- If the selector starts with a combinator other than the white space form of the descendant combinator, prepend :scope as the initial compound selector.
- Otherwise, if the selector does not contain any instance of the :scope pseudo-class (either at the top-level or as an argument to a functional pseudo-class), prepend :scope followed by the white space form of the descendant combinator.
- Otherwise, the selector is already absolute.
To absolutize a relative selector list, absolutize each relative selector in the list.
3.5. Pseudo-classes
Pseudo-classes are simple selectors that permit selection based on information that lies outside of the document tree or that can be awkward or impossible to express using the other simple selectors. They can also be dynamic, in the sense that an element can acquire or lose a pseudo-class while a user interacts with the document, without the document itself changing. Pseudo-classes do not appear in or modify the document source or document tree.
The syntax of a pseudo-class consists of a ":" (U+003A COLON) followed by the name of the pseudo-class as a CSS identifier, and, in the case of a functional pseudo-class, a pair of parentheses containing its arguments.
For example, :valid is a regular pseudo-class, and :lang() is a functional pseudo-class.
Like all CSS keywords, pseudo-class names are ASCII case-insensitive. No white space is allowed between the colon and the name of the pseudo-class, nor, as usual for CSS syntax, between a functional pseudo-class’s name and its opening parenthesis (which thus form a CSS function token). Also as usual, white space is allowed around the arguments inside the parentheses of a functional pseudo-class unless otherwise specified.
Like other simple selectors, pseudo-classes are allowed in all compound selectors contained in a selector, and must follow the type selector or universal selector, if present.
Note: Some pseudo-classes are mutually exclusive (such that a compound selector containing them, while valid, will never match anything), while others can apply simultaneously to the same element.
3.6. Pseudo-elements
Similar to how certain pseudo-classes represent additional state information not directly present in the document tree, a pseudo-element represents an element not directly present in the document tree. They are used to create abstractions about the document tree beyond those provided by the document tree. For example, pseudo-elements can be used to select portions of the document that do not correspond to a document-language element (including such ranges as don’t align to element boundaries or fit within its tree structure); that represent content not in the document tree or in an alternate projection of the document tree; or that rely on information provided by styling, layout, user interaction, and other processes that are not reflected in the document tree.
Pseudo-elements can also represent content that doesn’t exist in the source document at all, such as the ::before and ::after pseudo-elements which allow additional content to be inserted before or after the contents of any element.
Like pseudo-classes pseudo-elements do not appear in or modify the document source or document tree. Accordingly, they also do not affect the interpretation of structural pseudo-classes or other selectors pertaining to their originating element or its tree.
The host language defines which pseudo-elements exist, their type, and their abilities. Pseudo-elements that exist in CSS are defined in [CSS21] (Level 2), [SELECT] (Level 3), and [CSS-PSEUDO-4] (Level 4).
3.6.1. Syntax
The syntax of a pseudo-element is "::" (two U+003A COLON characters) followed by the name of the pseudo-element as an identifier. Pseudo-element names are ASCII case-insensitive. No white space is allowed between the two colons, or between the colons and the name.
Because CSS Level 1 and CSS Level 2 conflated pseudo-elements and pseudo-classes by sharing a single-colon syntax for both, user agents must also accept the previous one-colon notation for the Level 1 & 2 pseudo-elements (::before, ::after, ::first-line, and ::first-letter). This compatibility notation is not allowed any other pseudo-elements. However, as this syntax is deprecated, authors should use the Level 3+ double-colon syntax for these pseudo-elements.
Pseudo-elements are featureless, and so can’t be matched by any other selector.
3.6.2. Binding to the Document Tree
Pseudo-elements do not exist independently in the tree: they are always bound to another element on the page, called their originating element. Syntactically, a pseudo-element immediately follows the compound selector representing its originating element. If this compound selector is omitted, it is assumed to be the universal selector *.
The selector ::first-line is equivalent to *::first-line, which selects the ::first-line pseudo-element on every element in the document.
When a pseudo-element is encountered in a selector, the part of the selector before the pseudo-element selects the originating element for the pseudo-element; the part of the selector after it, if any, applies to the pseudo-element itself. (See below.)
3.6.3. Pseudo-classing Pseudo-elements
A pseudo-element may be immediately followed by any combination of the user action pseudo-classes, in which case the pseudo-element is represented only when it is in the corresponding state. Whether these pseudo-classes can match on the pseudo-element depends on the pseudo-class and pseudo-element’s definitions: unless otherwise-specified, none of these pseudo-classes will match on the pseudo-element.
Clarify that :not() and :matches() can be used when containing above-mentioned pseudos.
Does ::first-line:not(:focus) match anything?
Notice that ::first-line:hover is very different from :hover::first-line, which matches the first line of any originating element that is hovered! For example, :hover::first-line also matches the first line of a paragraph when the second line of the paragraph is hovered, whereas ::first-line:hover only matches if the first line itself is hovered.
Note: Note that, unless otherwise specified in a future specification, pseudo-classes other than the user action pseudo-classes are not valid when compounded to a pseudo-element; so, for example, ::before:first-child is an invalid selector.
3.6.4. Internal Structure
Some pseudo-elements are defined to have internal structure. These pseudo-elements may be followed by child/descendant combinators to express those relationships. Selectors containing combinators after the pseudo-element are otherwise invalid.
Note: A future specification may expand the capabilities of existing pseudo-elements, so some of these currently-invalid selectors (e.g. ::first-line :any-link) may become valid in the future.
The children of such pseudo-elements can simultaneously be children of other elements, too. However, at least in CSS, their rendering must be defined so as to maintain the tree-ness of the box tree.
<div> <span>foo</span> <"shadow root"> <content></content> </"shadow root"> </div>
the selectors div > span and div::shadow ::content > span select the same element via different paths.
However, when rendered,
the <span>
element generates boxes as if it were the child of the <content>
element,
rather than the <div>
element,
so the tree structure of the box tree is maintained.
3.7. Characters and case sensitivity
All Selectors syntax is case-insensitive within the ASCII range (i.e. [a-z] and [A-Z] are equivalent), except for the parts that are not under the control of Selectors: specifically, the case-sensitivity of document language element names, attribute names, and attribute values depends on the document language.
Case sensitivity of namespace prefixes is defined in [CSS3NAMESPACE]. Case sensitivity of language ranges is defined in the :lang() section.
White space in Selectors consists of the code points SPACE (U+0020), TAB (U+0009), LINE FEED (U+000A), CARRIAGE RETURN (U+000D), and FORM FEED (U+000C). Other space-like code points, such as EM SPACE (U+2003) and IDEOGRAPHIC SPACE (U+3000), are never considered syntactic white space.
Code points in Selectors can be escaped with a backslash
according to the same escaping rules as CSS. [CSS21] Note that escaping a code point “cancels out”
any special meaning it may have in Selectors.
For example, the selector #foo>a contains a combinator,
but #foo\>a instead selects an element with the id foo>a
.
3.8. Declaring Namespace Prefixes
Certain selectors support namespace prefixes. The mechanism by which namespace prefixes are declared should be specified by the language that uses Selectors. If the language does not specify a namespace prefix declaration mechanism, then no prefixes are declared. In CSS, namespace prefixes are declared with the @namespacerule. [CSS3NAMESPACE]
3.9. Invalid Selectors and Error Handling
User agents must observe the rules for handling invalid selectors:
- a parsing error in a selector, e.g. an unrecognized token or a token which is not allowed at the current parsing point (see §17 Grammar), causes that selector to be invalid.
- a simple selector containing an undeclared namespace prefix is invalid
- a selector containing an invalid simple selector, an invalid combinator or an invalid token is invalid.
- a selector list containing an invalid selector is invalid.
- an empty selector, i.e. one that contains no compound selector, is invalid.
Note: Consistent with CSS’s forwards-compatible parsing principle, UAs must treat as invalid any pseudo-classes, pseudo-elements, combinators, or other syntactic constructs for which they have no usable level of support. See Partial Implementations.
An invalid selector represents, and therefore matches, nothing.
4. Logical Combinations
4.1. Selector Lists
A comma-separated list of selectors represents the union of all elements selected by each of the individual selectors in the selector list. (A comma is U+002C.) For example, in CSS when several selectors share the same declarations, they may be grouped into a comma-separated list. White space may appear before and/or after the comma.
h1 { font-family: sans-serif } h2 { font-family: sans-serif } h3 { font-family: sans-serif }
is equivalent to:
h1, h2, h3 { font-family: sans-serif }
Warning: the equivalence is true in this example because all the selectors are valid selectors. If just one of these selectors were invalid, the entire selector list would be invalid. This would invalidate the rule for all three heading elements, whereas in the former case only one of the three individual heading rules would be invalidated.
h1 { font-family: sans-serif } h2..foo { font-family: sans-serif } h3 { font-family: sans-serif }
is not equivalent to:
h1, h2..foo, h3 { font-family: sans-serif }
because the above selector (h1, h2..foo, h3) is entirely invalid and the entire style rule is dropped. (When the selectors are not grouped, only the rule for h2..foo is dropped.)
4.2. The Matches-any Pseudo-class: :matches()
The matches-any pseudo-class, :matches(), is a functional pseudo-class taking a selector list as its argument. It represents an element that is represented by its argument.
Note: The specificity of the :matches() pseudo-class is replaced by the specificity of its argument. Thus, a selector written with :matches() has equivalent specificity to the equivalent selector written without :matches() For example, :matches(ul, ol, .list) > [hidden] and ul > [hidden], ol > [hidden], .list > [hidden] are equivalent in both their matching behavior and specificity. See §16 Calculating a selector’s specificity. ISSUE: See also issue 1027.
Pseudo-elements cannot be represented by the matches-any pseudo-class; they are not valid within :matches().
Default namespace declarations do not affect the compound selector representing the subject of any selector within a :matches() pseudo-class, unless that compound selector contains an explicit universal selector or type selector.
Why this exception for the explicit universal selector?
*|*:matches(:hover, :focus)
The following selector, however, represents only hovered or focused elements that are in the default namespace, because it uses an explicit universal selector within the :matches() notation:
*|*:matches(*:hover, *:focus)
4.3. The Negation Pseudo-class: :not()
The negation pseudo-class, :not(), is a functional pseudo-class taking a selector list as an argument. It represents an element that is not represented by its argument.
Note: In Selectors Level 3, only a single simple selector was allowed as the argument to :not().
Note: The specificity of the :not() pseudo-class is replaced by the specificity of the most specific selector in its argument; thus it has the exact behavior of :not(:matches(argument)). See §16 Calculating a selector’s specificity.
Pseudo-elements cannot be represented by the negation pseudo-class; they are not valid within :not().
button:not([DISABLED])
The following selector represents all but FOO elements.
*:not(FOO)
The following compound selector represents all HTML elements except links.
html|*:not(:link):not(:visited)
As with :matches(), default namespace declarations do not affect the compound selector representing the subject of any selector within a :not() pseudo-class, unless that compound selector contains an explicit universal selector or type selector. (See :matches() for examples.)
Note: The :not() pseudo-class allows useless selectors to be written. For instance :not(*|*), which represents no element at all, or div:not(span), which is equivalent to div but with a higher specificity.
4.4. The Specificity-adjustment Pseudo-class: :something()
The Specificity-adjustment pseudo-class, :something(),
is a functional pseudo-class
with the same syntax and functionality as :matches().
Unlike :matches(), neither the :something pseudo-class, nor any of its arguments
contribute to the specificity of the selector—
This is useful for introducing filters in a selector while keeping the associated style declarations easy to override.
This pseudo-class needs a name. See previous discussion, open issue.
a:not(:hover) { text-decoration: none; } nav a { /* Has no effect */ text-decoration: underline; }
However, by using :something() the author can explicitly declare their intent:
a:something(:not(:hover)) { text-decoration: none; } nav a { /* Works now! */ text-decoration: underline; }
Note: Future levels of Selectors may introduce an additional argument to explicitly set the specificity of that instance of the pseudo-class.
4.5. The Relational Pseudo-class: :has()
The relational pseudo-class, :has(), is a functional pseudo-class taking a relative selector list as an argument. It represents an element if any of the relative selectors, when absolutized and evaluated with the element as the :scope elements, would match at least one element.
<a>
elements that contain an <img>
child:
a:has(> img)
The following selector matches a <dt>
element
immediately followed by another <dt>
element:
dt:has(+ dt)
The following selector matches <section>
elements
that don’t contain any heading elements:
section:not(:has(h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6))
Note that ordering matters in the above selector. Swapping the nesting of the two pseudo-classes, like:
section:has(:not(h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6))
...would result matching any <section>
element
which contains anything that’s not a header element.
5. Elemental selectors
5.1. Type (tag name) selector
A type selector is the name of a document language element type, and represents an instance of that element type in the document tree.
A type selector is written as a CSS qualified name: an identifier with an optional namespace prefix. [CSS3NAMESPACE] (See §5.3 Namespaces in Elemental Selectors.)
5.2. Universal selector
The universal selector is a special type selector, that represents an element of any element type.
It is written a CSS qualified name with an asterisk (*
U+002A) as the local name.
Like a type selector,
the universal selector can be qualified by a namespace,
restricting it to only elements belonging to that namespace,
and is affected by a default namespace as defined in §5.3 Namespaces in Elemental Selectors.
Unless an element is featureless, the presence of a universal selector has no effect on whether the element matches the selector. (Featureless elements do not match any selector, including the universal selector.)
- *[hreflang|=en] and [hreflang|=en] are equivalent,
- *.warning and .warning are equivalent,
- *#myid and #myid are equivalent.
The universal selector follows the same syntax rules as other type selectors: only one can appear per compound selector, and it must be the first simple selector in the compound selector.
Note: In some cases, adding a universal selector can make a selector easier to read, even though it has no effect on the matching behavior. For example, div :first-child and div:first-child are somewhat difficult to tell apart at a quick glance, but writing the former as div *:first-child makes the difference obvious.
5.3. Namespaces in Elemental Selectors
Type selectors and universal selectors allow an optional namespace component:
a namespace prefix that has been previously declared may be prepended to the element name separated by the namespace separator “vertical bar” (|
U+007C).
(See, e.g., [XML-NAMES] for the use of namespaces in XML.)
It has the following meaning in each form:
ns|E
- elements with name E in namespace ns
*|E
- elements with name E in any namespace, including those without a namespace
|E
- elements with name E without a namespace
E
- if no default namespace has been declared for selectors, this is equivalent to *|E. Otherwise it is equivalent to ns|E where ns is the default namespace.
@namespace foo url(http://www.example.com); foo|h1 { color: blue } /* first rule */ foo|* { color: yellow } /* second rule */ |h1 { color: red } /* ...*/ *|h1 { color: green } h1 { color: green }
The first rule (not counting the @namespace at-rule) will match only h1 elements in the "http://www.example.com" namespace.
The second rule will match all elements in the "http://www.example.com" namespace.
The third rule will match only h1 elements with no namespace.
The fourth rule will match h1 elements in any namespace (including those without any namespace).
The last rule is equivalent to the fourth rule because no default namespace has been defined.
If a default namespace is declared, compound selectors without type selectors in them still only match elements in that default namespace.
@namespace url("http://example.com/foo"); .special { ... }
The .special selector only matches elements in the "http://example.com/foo" namespace, even though no reference to the type name (which is paired with the namespace in the DOM) appeared.
A type selector or universal selector containing a namespace prefix that has not been previously declared is an invalid selector.
6. Attribute selectors
Selectors allow the representation of an element’s attributes. When a selector is used as an expression to match against an element, an attribute selector must be considered to match an element if that element has an attribute that matches the attribute represented by the attribute selector.
Add comma-separated syntax for multiple-value matching? e.g. [rel ~= next, prev, up, first, last]
6.1. Attribute presence and value selectors
CSS2 introduced four attribute selectors:
- [att]
- Represents an element with the
att
attribute, whatever the value of the attribute. - [att=val]
- Represents an element with the
att
attribute whose value is exactly "val". - [att~=val]
- Represents an element with the
att
attribute whose value is a whitespace-separated list of words, one of which is exactly "val". If "val" contains whitespace, it will never represent anything (since the words are separated by spaces). Also if "val" is the empty string, it will never represent anything. - [att|=val]
- Represents an element with the
att
attribute, its value either being exactly "val" or beginning with "val" immediately followed by "-" (U+002D). This is primarily intended to allow language subcode matches (e.g., thehreflang
attribute on the a element in HTML) as described in BCP 47 ([BCP47]) or its successor. Forlang
(orxml:lang
) language subcode matching, please see the :lang pseudo-class.
Attribute values must be <ident-token>s or <string-token>s. [CSS3SYN]
The following attribute selector represents an h1 element
that carries the title
attribute,
whatever its value:
h1[title]
In the following example, the selector represents a span element whose class
attribute has
exactly the value "example":
span[class="example"]
Multiple attribute selectors can be used to represent several
attributes of an element, or several conditions on the same
attribute. Here, the selector represents a span element
whose hello
attribute has exactly the value "Cleveland"
and whose goodbye
attribute has exactly the value
"Columbus":
span[hello="Cleveland"][goodbye="Columbus"]
The following CSS rules illustrate the differences between
"=" and "~=". The first selector would match, for example, an a element with the value "copyright copyleft
copyeditor" on a rel
attribute. The second selector
would only match an a element with an href
attribute having the exact value "http://www.w3.org/".
a[rel~="copyright"] { ... } a[href="http://www.w3.org/"] { ... }
The following selector represents an a element
whose hreflang
attribute is exactly "fr".
a[hreflang=fr]
The following selector represents an a element for
which the value of the hreflang
attribute begins with
"en", including "en", "en-US", and "en-scouse":
a[hreflang|="en"]
The following selectors represent a DIALOGUE element
whenever it has one of two different values for an attribute character
:
DIALOGUE[character=romeo] DIALOGUE[character=juliet]
6.2. Substring matching attribute selectors
Three additional attribute selectors are provided for matching substrings in the value of an attribute:
- [att^=val]
- Represents an element with the
att
attribute whose value begins with the prefix "val". If "val" is the empty string then the selector does not represent anything. - [att$=val]
- Represents an element with the
att
attribute whose value ends with the suffix "val". If "val" is the empty string then the selector does not represent anything. - [att*=val]
- Represents an element with the
att
attribute whose value contains at least one instance of the substring "val". If "val" is the empty string then the selector does not represent anything.
Attribute values must be <ident-token>s or <string-token>s.
object[type^="image/"]
The following selector represents an HTML a element
with an href
attribute whose value ends with ".html".
a[href$=".html"]
The following selector represents an HTML paragraph
with a title
attribute whose value contains the substring "hello"
p[title*="hello"]
6.3. Case-sensitivity
By default case-sensitivity of attribute names and values in selectors
depends on the document language. To match attribute values case-insensitively
regardless of document language rules, the attribute selector may include the
identifier i
before the closing bracket (]
).
When this flag is present, UAs must match the attribute’s value
case-insensitively within the ASCII range.
Like the rest of Selectors syntax,
the i
identifier is case-insensitive within the ASCII range.
frame
attribute when it
has a value of hsides
, whether that value is represented
as hsides
, HSIDES
, hSides
, etc.
even in an XML environment where attribute values are case-sensitive.
[frame=hsides i] { border-style: solid none; }
6.4. Attribute selectors and namespaces
The attribute name in an attribute selector is given as a CSS qualified
name: a namespace prefix that has been previously declared may be prepended to the attribute name separated by the namespace
separator "vertical bar" (|
). In keeping with
the Namespaces in the XML recommendation, default namespaces do not
apply to attributes, therefore attribute selectors without a namespace
component apply only to attributes that have no namespace (equivalent
to |attr). An asterisk may be used for
the namespace prefix indicating that the selector is to match all
attribute names without regard to the attribute’s namespace.
An attribute selector with an attribute name containing a namespace prefix that has not been previously declared is an invalid selector.
@namespace foo "http://www.example.com"; [foo|att=val] { color: blue } [*|att] { color: yellow } [|att] { color: green } [att] { color: green }
The first rule will match only elements with the attribute att
in the "http://www.example.com" namespace with the
value "val".
The second rule will match only elements with the attribute att
regardless of the namespace of the attribute
(including no namespace).
The last two rules are equivalent and will match only elements
with the attribute att
where the attribute is not
in a namespace.
6.5. Default attribute values in DTDs
Attribute selectors represent attribute values in the document tree. How that document tree is constructed is outside the scope of Selectors. In some document formats default attribute values can be defined in a DTD or elsewhere, but these can only be selected by attribute selectors if they appear in the document tree. Selectors should be designed so that they work whether or not the default values are included in the document tree.
For example, a XML UA may, but is not required to, read an “external subset” of the DTD, but is required to look for default attribute values in the document’s “internal subset”. (See, e.g., [XML10] for definitions of these subsets.) Depending on the UA, a default attribute value defined in the external subset of the DTD might or might not appear in the document tree.
A UA that recognizes an XML namespace may, but is not required to use its knowledge of that namespace to treat default attribute values as if they were present in the document. (For example, an XHTML UA is not required to use its built-in knowledge of the XHTML DTD. See, e.g., [XML-NAMES] for details on namespaces in XML 1.0.)
Note: Typically, implementations choose to ignore external subsets. This corresponds to the behavior of non-validating processors as defined by the XML specification.
Consider an element EXAMPLE
with an attribute radix
that has a default value of "decimal"
. The DTD fragment might be
<!ATTLIST EXAMPLE radix (decimal,octal) "decimal">
If the style sheet contains the rules
EXAMPLE[radix=decimal] { /*... default property settings ...*/ } EXAMPLE[radix=octal] { /*... other settings...*/ }
the first rule might not match elements whose radix
attribute is
set by default, i.e. not set explicitly. To catch all cases, the
attribute selector for the default value must be dropped:
EXAMPLE { /*... default property settings ...*/ } EXAMPLE[radix=octal] { /*... other settings...*/ }
Here, because the selector ''EXAMPLE[radix=octal]'' is
more specific than the type selector alone, the style declarations in
the second rule will override those in the first for elements that
have a radix
attribute value of "octal"
. Care has to be taken that
all property declarations that are to apply only to the default case
are overridden in the non-default cases' style rules.
6.6. Class selectors
The class selector is given as a full stop (. U+002E) immediately
followed by an identifier. It represents an element belonging to the
class identified by the identifier, as defined by the document language.
For example, in [HTML5], [SVG11], and [MATHML] membership in a
class is given by the class
attribute: in these languages
it is equivalent to the ~=
notation applied to the
local class
attribute
(i.e. [class~=identifier]
).
We can assign style information to all elements with class~="pastoral"
as follows:
*.pastoral { color: green } /* all elements with class~=pastoral */
or just
.pastoral { color: green } /* all elements with class~=pastoral */
The following assigns style only to H1 elements with class~="pastoral"
:
H1.pastoral { color: green } /* H1 elements with class~=pastoral */
Given these rules, the first H1
instance below would not have
green text, while the second would:
<H1>Not green</H1> <H1 class="pastoral">Very green</H1>
The following rule matches any P element whose class
attribute has been assigned a list of whitespace-separated values that includes both pastoral
and marine
:
p.pastoral.marine { color: green }
This rule matches when class="pastoral blue aqua
marine"
but does not match for class="pastoral
blue"
.
Note: Because CSS gives considerable power to the "class" attribute, authors could conceivably design their own "document language" based on elements with almost no associated presentation (such as div and span in HTML) and assigning style information through the "class" attribute. Authors should avoid this practice since the structural elements of a document language often have recognized and accepted meanings and author-defined classes may not.
Note: If an element has multiple class attributes, their values must be concatenated with spaces between the values before searching for the class. As of this time the working group is not aware of any manner in which this situation can be reached, however, so this behavior is explicitly non-normative in this specification.
When matching against a document which is in quirks mode, class names must be matched ASCII case-insensitively; class selectors are otherwise case-sensitive.
6.7. ID selectors
Document languages may contain attributes that are declared to be of type ID.
What makes attributes of type ID special
is that no two such attributes can have the same value in a conformant document,
regardless of the type of the elements that carry them;
whatever the document language,
an ID typed attribute can be used to uniquely identify its element.
In HTML all ID attributes are named id
;
XML applications may name ID attributes differently,
but the same restriction applies.
Which attribute on an element is considered the “ID attribute“ is defined by the document language.
An ID selector consists of a “number sign” (U+0023, #
)
immediately followed by the ID value,
which must be a CSS identifier.
An ID selector represents an element instance that has an identifier that matches the identifier in the ID selector.
(It is possible in non-conforming documents for multiple elements to match a single ID selector.)
h1#chapter1
The following ID selector represents any element whose ID-typed attribute has the value "chapter1":
#chapter1
The following selector represents any element whose ID-typed attribute has the value "z98y".
*#z98y
Note: In XML 1.0 [XML10], the information about which attribute contains an element’s IDs is contained in a DTD or a schema. When parsing XML, UAs do not always read the DTD, and thus may not know what the ID of an element is (though a UA may have namespace-specific knowledge that allows it to determine which attribute is the ID attribute for that namespace). If a style sheet author knows or suspects that a UA may not know what the ID of an element is, he should use normal attribute selectors instead: ''[name=p371] instead of #p371''.
If an element has multiple ID attributes, all of them must be treated as IDs for that element for the purposes of the ID selector. Such a situation could be reached using mixtures of xml:id, DOM3 Core, XML DTDs, and namespace-specific knowledge.
When matching against a document which is in quirks mode, IDs must be matched ASCII case-insensitively; ID selectors are otherwise case-sensitive.
7. Linguistic Pseudo-classes
7.1. The Directionality Pseudo-class: :dir()
The :dir() pseudo-class allows the author to write
selectors that represent an element based on its directionality
as determined by the document language.
For example, [HTML5] defines how to determine the directionality of an element,
based on a combination of the dir
attribute, the surrounding text, and other factors.
As another example, the its:dir
and dirRule
element
of the Internationalization Tag Set [ITS20] are able to define the directionality of an element in [XML10].
The :dir() pseudo-class does not select based on stylistic states—for example, the CSS direction property does not affect whether it matches.
The pseudo-class :dir(ltr) represents an element that
has a directionality of left-to-right (ltr
). The
pseudo-class :dir(rtl) represents an element that has
a directionality of right-to-left (rtl
). The argument to :dir() must be a single identifier, otherwise the selector
is invalid. White space is optionally allowed between the identifier
and the parentheses. Values other than ltr
and rtl
are not invalid, but do not match anything. (If a
future markup spec defines other directionalities, then Selectors may
be extended to allow corresponding values.)
The difference between :dir(C) and ''[dir=C]''
is that ''[dir=C]'' only performs a comparison against a given
attribute on the element, while the :dir(C) pseudo-class
uses the UAs knowledge of the document’s semantics to perform the
comparison. For example, in HTML, the directionality of an element
inherits so that a child without a dir
attribute will have
the same directionality as its closest ancestor with a valid dir
attribute. As another example, in HTML,
an element that matches ''[dir=auto]'' will match either :dir(ltr) or :dir(rtl) depending on the resolved
directionality of the elements as determined by its contents. [HTML5]
7.2. The Language Pseudo-class: :lang()
If the document language specifies how the (human) content language of an element is determined, it is possible to write selectors that represent an element based on its content language. The :lang() pseudo-class represents an element that is in one of the languages listed in its argument. It accepts a comma-separated list of one or more language ranges as its argument. Each language range in :lang() must be a valid CSS <ident> or <string>. (Language ranges containing asterisks, for example, must be quoted as strings.)
Note: The content language of an element is defined by the document language.
For example, in HTML [HTML5], the content language is determined by a
combination of the lang
attribute, information from meta elements, and possibly also the protocol (e.g.
from HTTP headers). XML languages can use the xml:lang
attribute to indicate language information for an element. [XML10]
The element’s content language matches a language range if its content language (normalized to BCP 47 syntax if necessary) matches the given language range in an extended filtering operation per [RFC4647] Matching of Language Tags (section 3.3.2). The matching is performed case-insensitively within the ASCII range. The language range does not need to be a valid language code to perform this comparison.
Note: It is recommended that
documents and protocols indicate language using codes from BCP 47 [BCP47] or its successor, and by means of xml:lang
attributes in the
case of XML-based documents [XML10]. See "FAQ: Two-letter or three-letter language codes."
html:lang(fr-be) html:lang(de) :lang(fr-be) > q :lang(de) > q
Note: One difference between :lang(C) and the ''|='' operator is that the ''|='' operator only performs a comparison against a given attribute on the element, while the :lang(C) pseudo-class uses the UAs knowledge of the document’s semantics to perform the comparison.
<body lang=fr> <p>Je suis français.</p> </body>
For example, :lang(de-DE) will match all of de-DE, de-DE-1996, de-Latn-DE, de-Latf-DE, de-Latn-DE-1996, whereas of those ''[lang|=de-DE] will only match de-DE'' and de-DE-1996.
To perform wildcard matching on the first subtag (the primary language), an asterisk must be used: *-CH will match all of de-CH, it-CH, fr-CH, and rm-CH.
To select against an element’s lang attribute value using this type of language range match, use both the attribute selector and language pseudo-class together, e.g. [lang]:lang(de-DE).
Note: Wildcard language matching and comma-separated lists are new in Level 4.
8. Location Pseudo-classes
8.1. The Hyperlink Pseudo-class: :any-link
The :any-link pseudo-class represents an element
that acts as the source anchor of a hyperlink.
For example, in [HTML5], any a, area, or link elements with an href
attribute
are hyperlinks, and thus match :any-link
.
It matches an element if the element would match either :link or :visited,
and is equivalent to :matches(:link, :visited).
8.2. The Link History Pseudo-classes: :link and :visited
User agents commonly display unvisited hyperlinks differently from previously visited ones. Selectors provides the pseudo-classes :link and :visited to distinguish them:
- The :link pseudo-class applies to links that have not yet been visited.
- The :visited pseudo-class applies once the link has been visited by the user.
After some amount of time, user agents may choose to return a visited link to the (unvisited) :link state.
The two states are mutually exclusive.
footnote
and already visited:
.footnote:visited
Since it is possible for style sheet authors to abuse the :link and :visited pseudo-classes to determine which sites a user has visited without the user’s consent, UAs may treat all links as unvisited links or implement other measures to preserve the user’s privacy while rendering visited and unvisited links differently.
8.3. The Local Link Pseudo-class: :local-link
The :local-link pseudo-class allows authors to style hyperlinks based on the users current location within a site. It represents an element that is the source anchor of a hyperlink whose target’s absolute URL matches the element’s own document URL. If the hyperlink’s target includes a fragment URL, then the fragment URL of the current URL must also match; if it does not, then the fragment URL portion of the current URL is not taken into account in the comparison.
nav :local-link { text-decoration: none; }
Note: The current URL of a page can change as a result of user actions
such as activating a link targetting a different fragment within the same page;
or by use of the pushState
API;
as well as by the more obvious actions of navigating to a different page
or following a redirect (which could be initiated by protocols such as HTTP,
markup instructions such as <meta http-equiv="...">
,
or scripting instructions ).
UAs must ensure that :local-link,
as well as the :target and :target-within pseudo-classes below,
respond correctly to all such changes in state.
8.4. The Target Pseudo-class: :target
In some document languages, the document’s URL can further point to specific elements within the document via the URL’s fragment. The elements pointed to in this way are the target elements of the document.
https://example.com/index.html#section2
,
for example,
points to the element with id="section2"
in the document at https://example.com/index.html
. The :target pseudo-class matches the document’s target elements. If the document’s URL has no fragment identifier, then the document has no target elements.
p.note:target
This selector represents a p
element of class note
that is the target element of the referring
URL.
:target { color : red } :target::before { content : url(target.png) }
8.5. The Target Container Pseudo-class: :target-within
The :target-within pseudo-class applies to elements for which the :target pseudo class applies as well as to an element whose descendant in the flat tree (including non-element nodes, such as text nodes) matches the conditions for matching :target-within.
8.6. The Reference Element Pseudo-class: :scope
In some contexts, selectors can be matched with an explicit set of :scope elements.
This is is a (potentially empty) set of elements
that provide a reference point for selectors to match against,
such as that specified by the querySelector()
call in [DOM].
The :scope pseudo-class represents any element that is a :scope element. If the :scope elements are not explicitly specified, but the selector is scoped and the scoping root is an element, then :scope represents the scoping root; otherwise, it represents the root of the document (equivalent to :root). Specifications intending for this pseudo-class to match specific elements rather than the document’s root element must define either a scoping root (if using scoped selectors) or an explicit set of :scope elements.
9. User Action Pseudo-classes
Interactive user interfaces sometimes change the rendering in response to user actions.  (In non-interactive user agents, these pseudo-classes are valid, but never match any element.)
These pseudo-classes are not mutually exclusive. An element can match several such pseudo-classes at the same time.
a:link /* unvisited links */ a:visited /* visited links */ a:hover /* user hovers */ a:active /* active links */
An example of combining dynamic pseudo-classes:
a:focus a:focus:hover
The last selector matches a elements that are in the pseudo-class :focus and in the pseudo-class :hover.
Note: The specifics of hit-testing, necessary to know when several of the pseudo-classes defined in this section apply, are not yet defined, but will be in the future.
9.1. The Pointer Hover Pseudo-class: :hover
The :hover pseudo-class applies while the user designates an element with a pointing device, but does not necessarily activate it. For example, a visual user agent could apply this pseudo-class when the cursor (mouse pointer) hovers over a box generated by the element. Interactive user agents that cannot detect hovering due to hardware limitations (e.g., a pen device that does not detect hovering) are still conforming; the selector will simply never match in such a UA.
An element also matches :hover if one of its descendants in the flat tree (including non-element nodes, such as text nodes) matches the above conditions.
Document languages may define additional ways in which an element can match :hover.
For example, [HTML5] defines a labeled control element as matching :hover
when its label is hovered.
Note: Since the :hover state can apply to an element because its child is designated by a pointing device, it is possible for :hover to apply to an element that is not underneath the pointing device.
The :hover pseudo-class can apply to any pseudo-element.
9.2. The Activation Pseudo-class: :active
The :active pseudo-class applies while an element is being activated by the user. For example, between the times the user presses the mouse button and releases it. On systems with more than one mouse button, :active applies only to the primary or primary activation button (typically the "left" mouse button), and any aliases thereof.
There may be document-language or implementation-specific limits on which elements can become :active. For example, [HTML5] defines a list of activatable elements.
An element also matches :active if one of its descendants in the flat tree (including non-element nodes, such as text nodes) matches the above conditions.
Document languages may define additional ways in which an element can match :active.
Note: An element can be both :visited and :active (or :link and :active).
9.3. The Input Focus Pseudo-class: :focus
The :focus pseudo-class applies while an element has the focus (accepts keyboard or mouse events, or other forms of input).
There may be document language or implementation specific limits on which elements can acquire :focus. For example, [HTML] defines a list of focusable areas.
Document languages may define additional ways in which an element can match :focus,
except that the :focus pseudo class must not automatically propagate to the parent element—
There’s a desire from authors to propagate :focus from a form control to its associated label
element;
the main objection seems to be implementation difficulty.
See CSSWG issue (CSS) and WHATWG issue (HTML).
9.4. The Focus-Indicated Pseudo-class: :focus-visible
The :focus-visible pseudo-class applies while an element matches the :focus pseudo-class and the UA determines via heuristics that the focus should be made evident on the element. (Many browsers show a “focus ring” by default in this case.)
On the other hand, UAs typically only display focus indicators on buttons
when they were focused by a keyboard interaction
(such as tabbing through the document)—
-
If the element has “native” focus indicator behavior (such as text fields or buttons), use :focus-visible.
-
Otherwise, if the element is emulating a text input, or something else that is intended to receive keyboard interaction, use :focus.
-
Otherwise, use :focus-visible.
When UAs choose to specially indicate focus on an element, or whether they specially indicate focus at all, is UA-dependent. Different UAs, the same UA on different operating systems, or the same UA on the same OS, but with different user settings, can make different choices as to when an element matches :focus-visible.
-
If the element received focus via a keyboard interaction, including indirectly, such as triggering a dialog by pressing a button using the keyboard, apply :focus-visible.
-
If a keyboard event occurs while an element is focused, even if the element wasn’t focused by a keyboard interaction, apply :focus-visible.
9.5. The Focus Container Pseudo-class: :focus-within
The :focus-within pseudo-class applies to any element for which the :focus pseudo class applies as well as to an element whose descendant in the flat tree (including non-element nodes, such as text nodes) matches the conditions for matching :focus.
9.6. The Drop Target Pseudo-class: :drop and :drop()
The :drop pseudo-class applies to all elements that are drop targets, as defined by the document language, while the user is “dragging” or otherwise conceptually carrying an item to be “dropped”.
The :drop() functional pseudo-class is identical to :drop, but allows additional filters to be specified that can exclude some drop targets. Its syntax is:
:drop( [ active || valid || invalid ]? )
The keywords have the following meanings:
- active
- The drop target is the current drop target for the drag operation. That is, if the user were to release the drag, it would be dropped onto this drop target.
- valid
-
If the document language has a concept of “valid” and “invalid” drop targets,
this only matches if the drop target is valid for the object currently being dragged.
Otherwise, it matches all drop targets.
For example, HTML’s
dropzone
attribute can specify that the drop target only accepts strings or files that are set to a given type. - invalid
- If the document language has a concept of “valid” and “invalid” drop targets, this only matches if the drop target is invalid for the object currently being dragged. Otherwise, it matches nothing.
Multiple keywords can be combined in the argument, representing only drop targets that satisfy all of the keywords. For example, :drop(valid active) will match the active drop target if it’s valid, but not if it’s invalid.
If no keywords are given in the argument, :drop() has the same meaning as :drop—
Turn this scenario into an example.
10. Time-dimensional Pseudo-classes
These pseudo-classes classify elements with respect to the currently-displayed or active position in some timeline, such as during speech rendering of a document, or during the display of a video using WebVTT to render subtitles.
CSS does not define this timeline; the host language must do so. If there is no timeline defined for an element, these pseudo-classes must not match the element.
Note: Ancestors of a :current element are also :current, but ancestors of a :past or :future element are not necessarily :past or :future as well. A given element matches at most one of :current, :past, or :future.
10.1. The Current-element Pseudo-class: :current
The :current pseudo-class represents the element, or an ancestor of the element, that is currently being displayed.
Its alternate form :current(), like :matches(), takes a list of compound selectors as its argument: it represents the :current element that matches the argument or, if that does not match, the innermost ancestor of the :current element that does. (If neither the :current element nor its ancestors match the argument, then the selector does not represent anything.)
:current(p, li, dt, dd) { background: yellow; }
10.2. The Past-element Pseudo-class: :past
The :past pseudo-class represents any element that is defined to occur entirely prior to a :current element. For example, the WebVTT spec defines the :past pseudo-class relative to the current playback position of a media element. If a time-based order of elements is not defined by the document language, then this represents any element that is a (possibly indirect) previous sibling of a :current element.
10.3. The Future-element Pseudo-class: :future
The :future pseudo-class represents any element that is defined to occur entirely after a :current element. For example, the WebVTT spec defines the :future pseudo-class relative to the current playback position of a media element. If a time-based order of elements is not defined by the document language, then this represents any element that is a (possibly indirect) next sibling of a :current element.
11. Resource State Pseudos
The pseudo-classes in this section apply to elements that represent loaded resources, particularly images/videos, and allow authors to select them based on some quality of their state.
11.1. Video/Audio Play State: the :playing and :paused pseudo-classes
The :playing pseudo-class represents an element representing an audio, video, or similar resource that is capable of being “played” or “paused”, when that element is “playing”. (This includes both when the element is explicitly playing, and when it’s temporarily stopped for some reason not connected to user intent, but will automatically resume when that reason is resolved, such as a “buffering” state.)
The :paused pseudo-class represents the same elements, but instead match when the element is not “playing”. (This includes both an explicit “paused” state, and other non-playing states like “loaded, hasn’t been activated yet”, etc.)
12. The Input Pseudo-classes
The pseudo-classes in this section mostly apply to elements that take user input, such as HTML’s input element.
12.1. Input Control States
12.1.1. The :enabled and :disabled Pseudo-classes
The :enabled pseudo-class represents user interface elements that are in an enabled state; such elements must have a corresponding disabled state.
Conversely, the :disabled pseudo-class represents user interface elements that are in a disabled state; such elements must have a corresponding enabled state.
What constitutes an enabled state, a disabled state, and a user interface element is host-language-dependent. In a typical document most elements will be neither :enabled nor :disabled. For example, [HTML5] defines non-disabled interactive elements to be :enabled, and any such elements that are explicitly disabled to be :disabled.
Note: CSS properties that might affect a user’s ability to interact with a given user interface element do not affect whether it matches :enabled or :disabled; e.g., the display and visibility properties have no effect on the enabled/disabled state of an element.
12.1.2. The Mutability Pseudo-classes: :read-only and :read-write
An element matches :read-write if it is user-alterable, as defined by the document language. Otherwise, it is :read-only.
For example, in [HTML5] a non-disabled non-readonly <input>
element is :read-write,
as is any element with the contenteditable
attribute set to the true state.
12.1.3. The Placeholder-shown Pseudo-class: :placeholder-shown
Input elements can sometimes show placeholder text
as a hint to the user on what to type in.
See, for example, the placeholder
attribute in [HTML5].
The :placeholder-shown pseudo-class
matches an input element that is showing such placeholder text.
12.1.4. The Default-option Pseudo-class: :default
The :default pseudo-class applies to the one or more UI elements that are the default among a set of similar elements. Typically applies to context menu items, buttons and select lists/menus.
One example is the default submit button among a set of buttons.
Another example is the default option from a popup menu.
In a select-many group (such as for pizza toppings), multiple elements can match :default.
For example, [HTML5] defines that :default matches the “default button” in a form,
the initially-selected <option>
(s) in a <select>
,
and a few other elements.
12.2. Input Value States
12.2.1. The Selected-option Pseudo-class: :checked
Radio and checkbox elements can be toggled by the user.
Some menu items are “checked” when the user selects them.
When such elements are toggled “on”
the :checked pseudo-class applies.
For example, [HTML5] defines that checked checkboxes, radio buttons, and selected <option>
elements match :checked.
While the :checked pseudo-class is dynamic in nature,
and can altered by user action,
since it can also be based on the presence of semantic attributes in the document
(such as the selected
and checked
attributes in [HTML5]),
it applies to all media.
input[type=checkbox]:not(:checked)
12.2.2. The Indeterminate-value Pseudo-class: :indeterminate
The :indeterminate pseudo-class applies to UI elements whose value is in an indeterminate state. For example, radio and checkbox elements can be toggled between checked and unchecked states, but are sometimes in an indeterminate state, neither checked nor unchecked. Similarly a progress meter can be in an indeterminate state when the percent completion is unknown. For example, [HTML5] defines how checkboxes can be made to match :indeterminate.
Like the :checked pseudo-class, :indeterminate applies to all media. Components of a radio-group initialized with no pre-selected choice, for example, would be :indeterminate even in a static display.
12.3. Input Value-checking
12.3.1. The Validity Pseudo-classes: :valid and :invalid
An element is :valid or :invalid when its contents or value is, respectively, valid or invalid with respect to data validity semantics defined by the document language (e.g. [XFORMS11] or [HTML5]). An element which lacks data validity semantics is neither :valid nor :invalid.
Note: There is a difference between an element which has no constraints,
and thus would always be :valid,
and one which has no data validity semantics at all,
and thus is neither :valid nor :invalid.
In HTML, for example, an <input type="text">
element may have no constraints,
but a p element has no validity semantics at all,
and so it never matches either of these pseudo-classes.
12.3.2. The Range Pseudo-classes: :in-range and :out-of-range
The :in-range and :out-of-range pseudo-classes apply only to elements that have range limitations. An element is :in-range or :out-of-range when the value that the element is bound to is in range or out of range with respect to its range limits as defined by the document language. An element that lacks data range limits or is not a form control is neither :in-range nor :out-of-range. E.g. a slider element with a value of 11 presented as a slider control that only represents the values from 1-10 is :out-of-range. Another example is a menu element with a value of "E" that happens to be presented in a popup menu that only has choices "A", "B" and "C".
12.3.3. The Optionality Pseudo-classes: :required and :optional
A form element is :required or :optional if a value for it is, respectively, required or optional before the form it belongs to can be validly submitted. Elements that are not form elements are neither required nor optional.
12.3.4. The User-interaction Pseudo-class: :user-invalid
The :user-invalid pseudo-class represents an element with incorrect input, but only after the user has significantly interacted with it. The :user-invalid pseudo-class must match an :invalid, :out-of-range, or blank-but-:required elements between the time the user has attempted to submit the form and before the user has interacted again with the form element. User-agents may allow it to match such elements at other times, as would be appropriate for highlighting an error to the user. For example, a UA may choose to have :user-invalid match an :invalid element once the user has typed some text into it and changed the focus to another element, and to stop matching only after the user has successfully corrected the input.
<form> <label> Volume: <input name='vol' type=number min=0 max=10 value=11> </label> ... </form>
Cross-check with :-moz-ui-invalid.
Add :-moz-ui-valid as :user-valid per WG resolution.
Evaluate proposed :dirty pseudo-class
Clarify that this (and :invalid/:valid) can apply to form and fieldset elements.
13. Tree-Structural pseudo-classes
Selectors introduces the concept of structural pseudo-classes to permit selection based on extra information that lies in the document tree but cannot be represented by other simple selectors or combinators.
Standalone text and other non-element nodes are not counted when calculating the position of an element in the list of children of its parent. When calculating the position of an element in the list of children of its parent, the index numbering starts at 1.
The structural pseudo-classes only apply to elements in the document tree; they must never match pseudo-elements.
13.1. :root pseudo-class
The :root pseudo-class represents an element that is the root of the document.
For example, in a DOM document, the :root pseudo-class matches the root element of the Document object. In HTML, this would be the html element (unless scripting has been used to modify the document).
13.2. :empty pseudo-class
The :empty pseudo-class represents an element that has no children at all. In terms of the document tree, only element nodes and content nodes (such as [DOM] text nodes, and entity references) whose data has a non-zero length must be considered as affecting emptiness; comments, processing instructions, and other nodes must not affect whether an element is considered empty or not.
<p></p>
foo:empty is not a valid representation for the following fragments:
<foo>bar</foo>
<foo><bar>bla</bar></foo>
<foo>this is not <bar>:empty</bar></foo>
The WG is considering whether to allow elements containing only white space to match this selector.
The advantage would be that—
13.3. :blank pseudo-class
The :blank pseudo-class is like the :empty pseudo-class, except that it additionally matches elements that only contain code points affected by whitespace processing. [CSS3TEXT]
<p>
</p>
The WG is considering whether to rename this or file its definition under the existing :empty pseudo-class. See discussion. There’s also a related issue on a selector for empty input fields which might legitimately steal this name.
13.4. Child-indexed Pseudo-classes
The pseudo-classes defined in this section select elements based on their index amongst their inclusive siblings.
Note: Selectors 3 described these selectors as selecting elements based on their index in the child list of their parents. (This description survives in the name of this very section, and the names of several of the pseudo-classes.) As there was no reason to exclude them from matching elements without parents, or with non-element parents, they have been rephrased to refer to an element’s relative index amongst its siblings.
13.4.1. :nth-child() pseudo-class
The :nth-child(An+B [of S]? ) pseudo-class notation represents elements that are among An+Bth elements from the list composed of their inclusive siblings that match the selector list S. If S is omitted, it defaults to *|*.
The An+B notation and its interpretation are defined in CSS Syntax 3 §6 The An+B microsyntax; it represents any index i = An + B for any positive integer n.
For example, this selector could address every other row in a table, and could be used to alternate the color of paragraph text in a cycle of four.
:nth-child(even) /* represents the 2nd, 4th, 6th, etc elements :nth-child(10n-1) /* represents the 9th, 19th, 29th, etc elements */ :nth-child(10n+9) /* Same */ :nth-child(10n+-1) /* Syntactically invalid, and would be ignored */
Note: The specificity of the :nth-child() pseudo-class is the specificity of a single pseudo-class plus the specificity of its selector argument S, if any. See §16 Calculating a selector’s specificity. Thus S:nth-child(An+B) and :nth-child(An+B of S) have the exact same specificity, although they do differ in behavior (see example below).
:nth-child(-n+3 of li.important)
Note that this is different from moving the selector outside of the function, like:
li.important:nth-child(-n+3)
This selector instead just selects the first three children if they also happen to be "important" list items.
Normally, to zebra-stripe a table’s rows, an author would use CSS similar to the following:
tr { background: white; } tr:nth-child(even) { background: silver; }
However, if some of the rows are hidden and not displayed, this can break up the pattern, causing multiple adjacent rows to have the same background color. Assuming that rows are hidden with the [hidden] attribute in HTML, the following CSS would zebra-stripe the table rows robustly, maintaining a proper alternating background regardless of which rows are hidden:
tr { background: white; } tr:nth-child(even of :not([hidden])) { background: silver; }
13.4.2. :nth-last-child() pseudo-class
The :nth-last-child(An+B [of S]? ) pseudo-class notation represents elements that are among An+Bth elements from the list composed of their inclusive siblings that match the selector list S, counting backwards from the end. If S is omitted, it defaults to *|*.
Note: The specificity of the :nth-last-child() pseudo-class, like the :nth-child() pseudo-class, combines the specificity of a regular pseudo-class with that of its selector argument S. See §16 Calculating a selector’s specificity.
The CSS Syntax Module [CSS3SYN] defines the An+B notation.
tr:nth-last-child(-n+2) /* represents the two last rows of an HTML table */ foo:nth-last-child(odd) /* represents all odd foo elements in their parent element, counting from the last one */
13.4.3. :first-child pseudo-class
The :first-child pseudo-class represents an element that if first among its inclusive siblings. Same as :nth-child(1).
div > p:first-child
This selector can represent the p
inside the div
of the following fragment:
<p> The last P before the note.</p> <div class="note"> <p> The first P inside the note.</p> </div>
but cannot represent the second p
in the following fragment:
<p> The last P before the note.</p> <div class="note"> <h2> Note </h2> <p> The first P inside the note.</p> </div>
The following two selectors are usually equivalent:
* > a:first-child /* a is first child of any element */ a:first-child /* Same (assuming a is not the root element) */
13.4.4. :last-child pseudo-class
The :last-child pseudo-class represents an element that is last among its inclusive siblings. Same as :nth-last-child(1).
li
that
is the last child of an ordered list ol
.
ol > li:last-child
13.4.5. :only-child pseudo-class
The :only-child pseudo-class represents an element that has no siblings. Same as :first-child:last-child or :nth-child(1):nth-last-child(1), but with a lower specificity.
13.5. Typed Child-indexed Pseudo-classes
The pseudo-elements in this section are similar to the Child Index Pseudo-classes, but they resolve based on an element’s index among elements of the same type (tag name) in their sibling list.
13.5.1. :nth-of-type() pseudo-class
The :nth-of-type(An+B) pseudo-class notation
represents the same elements that would be matched by :nth-child(|An+B| of S),
where S is a type selector and namespace prefix matching the element in question.
For example,
when considering whether an HTML img
element matches this pseudo-class,
the S in question is html|img (assuming an appropriate html
namespace is declared).
img:nth-of-type(2n+1) { float: right; } img:nth-of-type(2n) { float: left; }
Note: If the type of the element is known ahead of time, this pseudo-class is equivalent to using :nth-child() with a type selector. That is, img:nth-of-type(2) is equivalent to *:nth-child(2 of img).
13.5.2. :nth-last-of-type() pseudo-class
The :nth-last-of-type(An+B) pseudo-class notation
represents the same elements that would be matched by :nth-last-child(|An+B| of S),
where S is a type selector and namespace prefix matching the element in question.
For example,
when considering whether an HTML img
element matches this pseudo-class,
the S in question is html|img (assuming an appropriate html
namespace is declared).
h2
children of an XHTML body
except the first and last, one could use the
following selector:
body > h2:nth-of-type(n+2):nth-last-of-type(n+2)
In this case, one could also use :not(), although the selector ends up being just as long:
body > h2:not(:first-of-type):not(:last-of-type)
13.5.3. :first-of-type pseudo-class
The :first-of-type pseudo-class represents the same element as :nth-of-type(1).
dt
inside a definition list dl
, this dt
being the first of its type in the list of children of
its parent element.
dl dt:first-of-type
It is a valid description for the first two dt
elements in the following example but not for the third one:
<dl> <dt>gigogne</dt> <dd> <dl> <dt>fusée</dt> <dd>multistage rocket</dd> <dt>table</dt> <dd>nest of tables</dd> </dl> </dd> </dl>
13.5.4. :last-of-type pseudo-class
The :last-of-type pseudo-class represents the same element as :nth-last-of-type(1).
td
of a table row tr
.
tr > td:last-of-type
13.5.5. :only-of-type pseudo-class
The :only-of-type pseudo-class represents the same element as :first-of-type:last-of-type.
14. Combinators
14.1. Descendant combinator (
)
At times, authors may want selectors to describe an element that is the descendant of another element in the document tree (e.g., "an em element that is contained within an H1 element"). The descendant combinator expresses such a relationship.
A descendant combinator is whitespace that separates two compound selectors.
A selector of the form A B represents an element B
that is an
arbitrary descendant of some ancestor element A
.
h1 em
It represents an em element being the descendant of an h1 element. It is a correct and valid, but partial, description of the following fragment:
<h1>This <span class="myclass">headline is <em>very</em> important</span></h1>
The following selector:
div * p
represents a p element that is a grandchild or later
descendant of a div element. Note the whitespace on
either side of the "*" is not part of the universal selector; the
whitespace is a combinator indicating that the div
must be the
ancestor of some element, and that that element must be an ancestor
of the p
.
The following selector, which combines descendant combinators and attribute selectors, represents an
element that (1) has the href
attribute set and (2) is
inside a p
that is itself inside a div
:
div p *[href]
14.2. Child combinator (>
)
A child combinator describes a childhood relationship between two elements. A child combinator is made of the "greater-than sign" (U+003E, >) code point and separates two compound selectors.
body
:
body > p
The following example combines descendant combinators and child combinators.
div ol>li p
It represents a p element that is a descendant of an li element; the li element must be the
child of an ol element; the ol element must
be a descendant of a div
. Notice that the optional white
space around the ">" combinator has been left out.
For information on selecting the first child of an element, please see the section on the :first-child pseudo-class above.
14.3. Next-sibling combinator (+
)
The next-sibling combinator is made of the “plus sign” (U+002B, +) code point that separates two compound selectors. The elements represented by the two compound selectors share the same parent in the document tree and the element represented by the first compound selector immediately precedes the element represented by the second one. Non-element nodes (e.g. text between elements) are ignored when considering the adjacency of elements.
math + p
The following selector is conceptually similar to the one in the
previous example, except that it adds an attribute selector — it
adds a constraint to the h1 element, that it must have class="opener"
:
h1.opener + h2
14.4. Subsequent-sibling combinator (~
)
The subsequent-sibling combinator is made of the "tilde" (U+007E, ~) code point that separates two compound selectors. The elements represented by the two compound selectors share the same parent in the document tree and the element represented by the first compound selector precedes (not necessarily immediately) the element represented by the second one.
h1 ~ pre
represents a pre element following an h1
. It
is a correct and valid, but partial, description of:
<h1>Definition of the function a</h1> <p>Function a(x) has to be applied to all figures in the table.</p> <pre>function a(x) = 12x/13.5</pre>
15. Grid-Structural Selectors
The double-association of a cell in a 2D grid (to its row and column) cannot be represented by parentage in a hierarchical markup language. Only one of those associations can be represented hierarchically: the other must be explicitly or implicitly defined in the document language semantics. In both HTML and DocBook, two of the most common hierarchical markup languages, the markup is row-primary (that is, the row associations are represented hierarchically); the columns must be implied. To be able to represent such implied column-based relationships, the column combinator and the :nth-col() and :nth-last-col() pseudo-classes are defined. In a column-primary format, these pseudo-classes match against row associations instead.
15.1. Column combinator
The column combinator, which consists of two pipes (||) represents the relationship of a column element to a cell element belonging to the column it represents. Column membership is determined based on the semantics of the document language only: whether and how the elements are presented is not considered. If a cell element belongs to more than one column, it is represented by a selector indicating membership in any of those columns.
col.selected || td { background: gray; color: white; font-weight: bold; }
<table> <col span="2"> <col class="selected"> <tr><td>A <td>B <td>C <tr><td colspan="2">D <td>E <tr><td>F <td colspan="2">G </table>
15.2. :nth-col() pseudo-class
The :nth-col(An+B) pseudo-class notation represents a cell element belonging to a column
that has An+B-1 columns before it, for any positive
integer or zero value of n
. Column membership is determined
based on the semantics of the document language only: whether and how the
elements are presented is not considered. If a cell element belongs to
more than one column, it is represented by a selector indicating any of
those columns.
The CSS Syntax Module [CSS3SYN] defines the An+B notation.
15.3. :nth-last-col() pseudo-class
The :nth-last-col(An+B) pseudo-class notation represents a cell element belonging to a column
that has An+B-1 columns after it, for any positive
integer or zero value of n
. Column membership is determined
based on the semantics of the document language only: whether and how the
elements are presented is not considered. If a cell element belongs to
more than one column, it is represented by a selector indicating any of
those columns.
The CSS Syntax Module [CSS3SYN] defines the An+B notation.
16. Calculating a selector’s specificity
A selector’s specificity is calculated for a given element as follows:
- count the number of ID selectors in the selector (= A)
- count the number of class selectors, attributes selectors, and pseudo-classes in the selector (= B)
- count the number of type selectors and pseudo-elements in the selector (= C)
- ignore the universal selector
If the selector is a selector list, this number is calculated for each selector in the list. For a given matching process against the list, the specificity in effect is that of the most specific selector in the list that matches.
A few pseudo-classes provide “evaluation contexts” for other selectors, and so have their specificity defined by their contents and how they match:
See also issue 1027.
- The specificity of a :matches() or :has() pseudo-class is replaced by the specificity applicable to its selector list argument. (When :matches() contains only compound selectors, the full selector’s specificity is thus equivalent to expanding out all the combinations in full, without :matches(); fully generalized, the specificity of :matches() is the specificity of the most specific selector within it that matches. The behavior for comma-separated arguments to :has() is analogous.)
- Analogously, the specificity of an :nth-child() or :nth-last-child() selector is the specificity of the pseudo class itself (counting as one pseudo-class selector) plus the specificity of its selector list argument (if any).
- The specificity of a :not() pseudo-class is replaced by the specificity of the most specific complex selector in its selector list argument.
- The specificity of a :something() pseudo-class is replaced by zero.
- :matches(em, #foo) has
a specificity of (0,0,1)--like a tag selector--when matched against
<em>
, and a specificity of (1,0,0)--like an ID selector--when matched against<em id=foo>
. - div:something(em, #foo#bar#baz) has a specificity of (0,0,1): only the div contributes to selector specificity.
- :nth-child(even of li, .item) has
a specificity of (0,1,1)--like a tag selector plus a pseudo-class--when matched against
<li>
, and a specificity of (0,2,0)--like a class selector plus a pseudo-class--when matched against<li class=item id=foo>
. - :not(em, #foo) has a specificity of (1,0,0)--like an ID selector--whenever it matches any element.
Specificities are compared by comparing the three components in order: the specificity with a larger A value is more specific; if the two A values are tied, then the specificity with a larger B value is more specific; if the two B values are also tied, then the specificity with a larger C value is more specific; if all the values are tied, the two specificities are equal.
Due to storage limitations, implementations may have limitations on the size of A, B, or C. If so, values higher than the limit must be clamped to that limit, and not overflow.
* /* a=0 b=0 c=0 */ LI /* a=0 b=0 c=1 */ UL LI /* a=0 b=0 c=2 */ UL OL+LI /* a=0 b=0 c=3 */ H1 + *[REL=up] /* a=0 b=1 c=1 */ UL OL LI.red /* a=0 b=1 c=3 */ LI.red.level /* a=0 b=2 c=1 */ #x34y /* a=1 b=0 c=0 */ #s12:not(FOO) /* a=1 b=0 c=1 */ .foo :matches(.bar, #baz) /* Either a=1 b=1 c=0 or a=0 b=2 c=0, depending on the element being matched. */
Note: Repeated occurrences of the same simple selector are allowed and do increase specificity.
Note: The specificity of the styles
specified in an HTML style
attribute is described in CSS Style Attributes. [CSSSTYLEATTR]
17. Grammar
Selectors are parsed according to the following grammar:
<selector-list> = <complex-selector-list> <complex-selector-list> = <complex-selector># <compound-selector-list> = <compound-selector># <simple-selector-list> = <simple-selector># <relative-selector-list> = <relative-selector># <complex-selector> = <compound-selector> [ <combinator>? <compound-selector> ]* <relative-selector> = <combinator>? <complex-selector> <compound-selector> = [ <type-selector>? <subclass-selector>* [ <pseudo-element-selector> <pseudo-class-selector>* ]* ]! <simple-selector> = <type-selector> | <subclass-selector> <combinator> = '>' | '+' | '~' | [ '||' ] <type-selector> = <wq-name> | <ns-prefix>? '*' <ns-prefix> = [ <ident-token> | '*' ]? '|' <wq-name> = <ns-prefix>? <ident-token> <subclass-selector> = <id-selector> | <class-selector> | <attribute-selector> | <pseudo-class-selector> <id-selector> = <hash-token> <class-selector> = '.' <ident-token> <attribute-selector> = '[' <wq-name> ']' | '[' <wq-name> <attr-matcher> [ <string-token> | <ident-token> ] <attr-modifier>? ']' <attr-matcher> = [ '~' | '|' | '^' | '$' | '*' ]? '=' <attr-modifier> = i <pseudo-class-selector> = ':' <ident-token> | ':' <function-token> <any-value> ')' <pseudo-element-selector> = ':' <pseudo-class-selector>
In interpreting the above grammar, the following rules apply:
-
White space is forbidden between tokens except:
-
Around commas (denoted with the # multiplier)
-
Around or in place of a <combinator>
-
Between the parentheses and argument of a functional <pseudo-class-selector> or <pseudo-element-selector>.
-
-
The four Level 2 pseudo-elements (::before, ::after, ::first-line, and ::first-letter) may, for legacy reasons, be represented using the <pseudo-class-selector> grammar, with only a single ":" character at their start.
-
In <id-selector>, the <hash-token>’s value must be an identifier.
Note: A selector is also subject to a variety of more specific syntactic constraints, and adherence to the grammar above is necessary but not sufficient for the selector to be considered valid. See §3.9 Invalid Selectors and Error Handling for additional rules for parsing selectors.
Note: The grammar above states that a combinator is optional between two <compound-selector>s in a <complex-selector>. This is only for grammatical purposes, as the CSS Value Definition Syntax’s lax treatment of whitespace makes it difficult to indicate that a grammar term can be whitespace. "Omitting" a combinator is actually just specifying the descendant combinator.
Note: In general, a <pseudo-element-selector> is only valid if placed at the end of the last <compound-selector> in a <complex-selector>. In some circumstances, however, it can be followed by more <pseudo-element-selector>s or <pseudo-class-selector>s; but these are specified on a case-by-case basis. (For example, the user action pseudo-classes are allowed after any pseudo-element, and the tree-abiding pseudo-elements are allowed after the ::slotted() pseudo-element)
18. API Hooks
To aid in the writing of specs that use Selectors concepts, this section defines several API hooks that can be invoked by other specifications.
Are these still necessary now that we have more rigorous definitions for match and invalid selector?
Nouns are a lot easier to coordinate across specification than predicates,
and details like the exact order of elements returned from querySelector
seem to make more sense being defined in the DOM specification than in Selectors.
18.1. Parse A Selector
This section defines how to parse a selector from a string source. It returns either a complex selector list, or failure.
- Let selector be the result of parsing source as a <selector-list>. If it does not match the grammar, return failure.
- Otherwise, if any simple selectors in selector are not recognized by the user agent, or selector is otherwise invalid in some way (such as, for example, containing an undeclared namespace prefix), return failure.
- Otherwise, return selector.
18.2. Parse A Relative Selector
This section defines how to parse a relative selector from a string source, against :scope elements refs. It returns either a complex selector list, or failure.
- Let selector be the result of parsing source as a <relative-selector-list>. If it does not match the grammar, return failure.
- Otherwise, if any simple selectors in selector are not recognized by the user agent, or selector is otherwise invalid in some way (such as, for example, containing an undeclared namespace prefix), return failure.
- Otherwise, absolutize selector with refs as the :scope elements.
- Return selector.
18.3. Match a Selector Against an Element
This section defines how to match a selector against an element.
APIs using this algorithm must provide a selector and an element.
Callers may optionally provide:
-
a set of :scope elements,
for resolving the :scope pseudo-class against.
If not specified,
the set defaults to being empty.
Should it instead default to the root element, to match the definition of :scope?
If the selector is a relative selector, the set of :scope elements must not be empty.
This algorithm returns either success or failure.
For each complex selector in the given selector (which is taken to be a list of complex selectors), match the complex selector against element, as described in the following paragraph. If the matching returns success for any complex selector, then the algorithm return success; otherwise it returns failure.
To match a complex selector against an element, process it compound selector at a time, in right-to-left order. This process is defined recursively as follows:
- If any simple selectors in the rightmost compound selector does not match the element, return failure.
- Otherwise, if there is only one compound selector in the complex selector, return success.
- Otherwise, consider all possible elements that could be related to this element by the rightmost combinator. If the operation of matching the selector consisting of this selector with the rightmost compound selector and rightmost combinator removed against any one of these elements returns success, then return success. Otherwise, return failure.
18.4. Match a Selector Against a Pseudo-element
This section defines how to match a selector against a pseudo-element.
APIs using this algorithm must provide a selector and a pseudo-element. They may optionally provide the same things they may optionally provide to the algorithm to match a selector against an element.
This algorithm returns success or failure.
For each complex selector in the given selector, if both:
- the rightmost simple selector in the complex selector matches pseudo-element, and
- the result of running match a complex selector against an element on the remainder of the complex selector (with just the rightmost simple selector of its rightmost complex selector removed), pseudo-element’s corresponding element, and any optional parameters provided to this algorithm returns success,
Otherwise (that is, if this doesn’t happen for any of the complex selectors in selector), return failure.
18.5. Match a Selector Against a Tree
This section defines how to match a selector against a tree.
APIs using this algorithm must provide a selector, and one or more root elements indicating the trees that will be searched by the selector. All of the root elements must share the same root, or else calling this algorithm is invalid.
They may optionally provide:
- A scoping root indicating the selector is scoped. If not specified, the selector defaults to being unscoped.
-
A set of :scope elements,
which will match the :scope pseudo-class.
If not specified,
then if the selector is a scoped selector,
the set of :scope elements default to the scoping root;
otherwise,
it defaults to the root elements.
Note: Note that if the selector is scoped, the scoping root is automatically taken as the :scope element, so it doesn’t have to be provided explicitly unless a different result is desired.
-
Which pseudo-elements are allowed to show up in the match list.
If not specified, this defaults to allowing all pseudo-elements.
Only the ::before and ::after pseudo-elements are really handled in any way remotely like this.
This algorithm returns a (possibly empty) list of elements.
- Start with a list of candidate elements, which are the the root elements and all of their descendant elements, sorted in shadow-including tree order, unless otherwise specified.
- If an optional scoping root was provided, then remove from the candidate elements any elements that are not descendants of the scoping root.
- Initialize the selector match list to empty.
-
For each element in the set of candidate elements:
- If the result of match a selector against an element for element and selector is success, add element to the selector match list.
-
For each possible pseudo-element associated with element that is one of the pseudo-elements allowed to show up in the match list,
if the result of match a selector against a pseudo-element for the pseudo-element and selector is success,
add the pseudo-element to the selector match list.
The relative position of pseudo-elements in selector match list is undefined. There’s not yet a context that exposes this information, but we need to decide on something eventually, before something is exposed.
19. Appendix A: Guidance on Mapping Source Documents & Data to an Element Tree
This section is informative.
The element tree structure described by the DOM is powerful and useful, but generic enough to model pretty much any language that describes tree-based data (or even graph-based, with a suitable interpretation).
Some languages, like HTML, already have well-defined procedures for producing a DOM object from a resource. If a given language does not, such a procedure must be defined in order for Selectors to apply to documents in that language.
At minimum, the document language must define what maps to the DOM concept of an "element".
The primary one-to-many relationship between nodes—
Other features of the element should be mapped to something that serves a similar purpose to the same feature in DOM:
- type
-
If the elements in the document language have some notion of "type"
as a basic distinguisher between different groups of elements,
it should be reflected as the "type" feature.
If this "type" can be separated into a "basic" name and a "namespace" that groups names into higher-level groups, the latter should be reflected as the "namespace" feature. Otherwise, the element shouldn’t have a "namespace" feature, and the entire name should be reflected as the "type" feature.
- id
-
If some aspect of the element functions as a unique identifier across the document,
it should be mapped to the "id" feature.
Note: While HTML only allows an element to have a single ID, this should not be taken as a general restriction. The important quality of an ID is that each ID should be associated with a single element; a single element can validly have multiple IDs.
- classes and attributes
- Aspects of the element that are useful for identifying the element, but are not generally unique to elements within a document, should be mapped to the "class" or "attribute" features depending on if they’re something equivalent to a "label" (a string by itself) or a "property" (a name/value pair)
- pseudo-classes and pseudo-attributes
-
If any elements match any pseudo-classes or have any pseudo-elements,
that must be explicitly defined.
Some pseudo-classes are *syntactical*, like :has() and :matches(), and thus should always work. Need to indicate that somewhere. Probably the structural pseudos always work whenever the child list is ordered.
- The "elements" of the JSON document are each array, object, boolean, string, number, or null. The array and object elements have their contents as children.
- Each element’s type is its JS type name: "array", "object", etc.
- Children of an object have their key as a class.
- Children of an array match the :first-child, :nth-child(), etc pseudo-classes.
- The root object matches :root.
- It additionally defines :val() and :contains() pseudo-classes, for matching boolean/number/string elements with a particular value or which contain a particular substring.
This structure is sufficient to allow powerful, compact querying of JSON documents with selectors.
20. Changes
Significant changes since the 2 May 2013 Working Draft include:
- Added the :target-within, :focus-within, :focus-visible, :playing, and :paused pseudo-classes.
- Added a zero-specificity :matches()-type pseudo-class, with name TBD.
- Replaced subject indicator (!) feature with :has().
- Replaced the :nth-match() and :nth-last-match() selectors with :nth-child(… of selector) and :nth-last-child(… of selector).
- Changed the :active-drop-target, :valid-drop-target, :invalid-drop-target with :drop().
- Sketched out an empty-or-whitespace-only selector for discussion (:blank). (See open issue.)
- Renamed :user-error to :user-invalid. (See Discussion)
- Renamed :nth-column()/:nth-last-column() to :nth-col()/:nth-last-col() to avoid naming confusion with a potential ::column pseudo-class.
- Changed the non-functional form of the :local-link pseudo-class to account for fragment URLs.
- Removed the functional form of the
:local-link()
pseudo-class and reference combinator for lack of interest. - Rewrote selectors grammar using the CSS Value Definition Syntax.
- Split out relative selectors from scoped selectors, as these are different concepts that can be independently invoked.
- Moved definition of <An+B> microsyntax to CSS Syntax.
-
Added new sections:
- §3.2 Data Model
-
§18 API Hooks
- Note that earlier versions of this section defined a section on evaluating a selector, but that section is no longer present. Specifications referencing that section should instead reference the algorithm to match a selector against a tree.
- Removed restriction on combinators within :matches() and :not(); see discussion.
- Defined specificity of a selector list. (Why?)
- Required quotes around :lang() values involving an asterisk; only language codes which happen to bhe CSS identifiers can be used unquoted.
Note: The 1 February 2018 draft included an inadvertent commit of unfinished work; 2 February 2018 has reverted this commit (and fixed some links because why not).
21. Acknowledgements
The CSS working group would like to thank everyone who contributed to the previous Selectors specifications over the years, as those specifications formed the basis for this one. In particular, the working group would like to extend special thanks to the following for their specific contributions to Selectors Level 4: L. David Baron, Andrew Fedoniouk, Ian Hickson, Grey Hodge, Lachlan Hunt, Jason Cranford Teague
22. Privacy and Security Considerations
This specification introduces no new privacy or security considerations, as selectors do not provide any ability not already possible by walking the DOM manually.