Gradient borders in CSS

Good day, dear habrovchane. I present to your attention the translation of the article by Chris Kour.

Suppose you need a gradient border around a certain element. And you, such, think:

• There is no simple and obvious CSS API for this.
• I'll just wrap the element with a linear-gradient background, and then the inner element will block most of this background, except for a thin line filling around it.

It will look something like this:

HTML

<div class="module-border-wrap"><div class="module"> Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet consectetur adipisicing elit. Vero pariatur corporis quaerat voluptatum eos tempora temporibus nisi voluptates sed, exercitationem sequi dolore culpa incidunt accusamus, quasi unde reprehenderit ea molestias. </div></div> 

 body { height: 100vh; margin: 0; display: grid; place-items: center; background: #222; } .module-border-wrap { max-width: 250px; padding: 1rem; position: relative; background: linear-gradient(to right, red, purple); padding: 3px; } .module { background: #222; color: white; padding: 2rem; } 

If you don't like the idea of ​​the wrapping element, you can use the pseudo-element, as long as the z-index is negative in order (this would not have happened if there were many attachments of the parent elements with their own backgrounds).

Here is an example of Stephen Shaw anchoring border-radius :

HTML

 <div class="gradient-box"> <p> Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Praesent bibendum, lorem vel tincidunt imperdiet, nibh elit laoreet felis, a bibendum nisl tortor non orci. Donec pretium fermentum felis, quis aliquet est rutrum ut. Integer quis massa ut lacus viverra pharetra in eu lacus. Aliquam tempus odio adipiscing diam pellentesque rhoncus. Curabitur a bibendum est. </p> </div> 

 .gradient-box { display: flex; align-items: center; //width: 50vw; width: 90%; margin: auto; max-width: 22em; position: relative; padding: 30% 2em; box-sizing: border-box; $border: 5px; color: #FFF; background: #000; background-clip: padding-box; /* !importanté */ border: solid $border transparent; /* !importanté */ border-radius: 1em; &:before { content: ''; position: absolute; top: 0; right: 0; bottom: 0; left: 0; z-index: -1; margin: -$border; /* !importanté */ border-radius: inherit; /* !importanté */ background: linear-gradient(to right, red, orange); } } html { height: 100%; background: #000; display: flex; } body { margin: auto; } 

But don't forget all about border-image , perhaps the most confused CSS property of all time. You can use it to get gradient borders even on separate sides:

HTML

 <div class="module"> Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet consectetur adipisicing elit. Vero pariatur corporis quaerat voluptatum eos tempora temporibus nisi voluptates sed, exercitationem sequi dolore culpa incidunt accusamus, quasi unde reprehenderit ea molestias. </div> 

 body { height: 100vh; margin: 0; display: grid; place-items: center; background: #222; } .module { max-width: 250px; padding: 1rem; color: white; border-width: 3px; border-style: solid; border-image: linear-gradient( to bottom, red, rgba(0, 0, 0, 0) ) 1 100%; } 

Using both border-image and border-image-slice is probably the easiest syntax to create a gradient border, but unfortunately, this is simply incompatible with border-radius .

HTML

 <div> <div class="on-light"> <button class="border-gradient border-gradient-purple"> I have a gradient </button> </div> <div class="on-dark"> <button class="border-gradient border-gradient-purple"> I have a gradient </button> </div> <div class="on-light"> <button class="border-gradient border-gradient-green"> I have a gradient </button> </div> <div class="on-dark"> <button class="border-gradient border-gradient-green"> I have a gradient </button> </div> </div> 

 button { background: none; text-decoration: inherit; font-family: system-ui; font-size: 1rem; padding: 1rem 2rem; } .border-gradient { border-image-slice: 1; border-width: 2px; } .border-gradient-purple { border-image: linear-gradient(to left, #743ad5, #d53a9d); } .border-gradient-green { border-image: linear-gradient(to left, #00C853, #B2FF59); } body { height: 100vh; margin: 0; display: flex; justify-content: center; align-items: center; > div { width: 100%; text-align: center; } > div > div { width: 100%; padding: 1rem; } } .on-dark { background: #222; button { color: white; } }