CSS Tutorials

Getting Started with CSS3 Guide

Mastering CSS in 16 lessons | Estimate time for completing the cource: 8 hours

3. CSS3 Basic Syntax

This tutorial walks you through the basics syntax of CSS.

The syntax for CSS style definition is quite simple it basically consists of only 3 parts.

selector { property: value }


HTML tag { CSS Property : Value ; }

NOTE: Each selector can have multiple properties!
p {  
  background-color: #f3f3f3;  
  height: 18px;  
  color: blue;  

NOTE: You can also combine elements within one selector to define a common style in the following way:

h1, h2, h6 { color: #789921; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; }


Comments in CSS3 are market with /* sample comment here */. I.e. you start the note with a / and then an * (asterisks) then follows the comment, next you use again * (asterisks) and the / to end the comment.

/* sample comment here */

Height and Width

With CSS you can control the height and width of different HTML elements by using the following height and width properties:

Height properties

Width properties

p { height:100px; width:100px; max-height:300px; max-width:500px; }


If you have defined a style for a HTML element it is considered like a global style and it is applied to all elements of the same type. The following rules are valid in terms of style inheritance in CSS:

In HTML when you have nested elements, the child element will inherit all style properties assigned to the parent element, unless you modify the child elements style, which will overwrite the parent`s style.

For example, a font declared in the <body> will be inherited by all <p> elements in the file, unless you declare another font for a <p> element.

body {font-family: Arial, serif;}
p {font-family: Tahoma, serif;}

Some style properties, like <font-family>, <text-alignment>, <color> etc., are automatically inherited by child elements, however others like <margin>, <padding>, <height>, <width>, etc. are not!

If you define a style property, and later define an alternative style property for the same element, the later definition overwrites the earlier one!