CSS Attribute Selectors

Style HTML Elements With Specific Attributes

It is possible to style HTML elements that have specific attributes or attribute values.

Selector	Example	Example description
[attribute]	[target]	Selects all elements with a target attribute
[attribute=value]	[target=_blank]	Selects all elements with target="_blank"
[attribute~=value]	[title~=bridge]	Selects all elements with a title attribute containing the word "bridge"
[attribute\|=value]	[lang\|=en]	Selects all elements with a lang attribute value starting with "en"
[attribute^=value]	a[href^="https"]	Selects every `<a>`element whose href attribute value begins with "https"
[attribute$=value]	a[href$=".pdf"]	Selects every `<a>` element whose href attribute value ends with ".pdf"
[attribute*=value]	a[href*="w3schools"]	Selects every `<a>` element whose href attribute value contains the substring "w3schools"

CSS `[attribute]` Selector

The [attribute] selector is used to select elements with a specified attribute.

The following example selects all <a> elements with a target attribute:

a[target] {  
	background-color:  blue;  
}

CSS `[attribute="value"]` Selector

The [attribute="value"] selector is used to select elements with a specified attribute and value.

The following example selects all <a> elements with a target="_blank" attribute:

a[target="_blank"] {  
	background-color:  yellow;  
}

CSS [attribute~="value"] Selector

The [attribute~="value"] selector is used to select elements with an attribute value containing a specified word.

The following example selects all elements with a title attribute that contains a space-separated list of words, one of which is "bridge":

[title~="bridge"] {  
	border:  5px solid blue;  
}

The example above will match elements with title="bridge", title="long bridge", and title="bridge new", but not title="my-bridge" or title="bridges".

CSS `[attribute|="value"]` Selector

The [attribute|="value"] selector is used to select elements with the specified attribute, whose value can be exactly the specified value, or the specified value followed by a hyphen (-).

note

The value has to be a whole word, either alone, like class="top", or followed by a hyphen( - ), like class="top-text".

[class|="top"] {  
	background:  blue;  
}

CSS `[attribute^="value"]` Selector

The [attribute^="value"] selector is used to select elements with the specified attribute, whose value starts with the specified value.

The following example selects all elements with a class attribute value that starts with "top":

note

The value does not have to be a whole word!

[class^="top"] {  
	background:  blue;  
}

CSS `[attribute$="value"]` Selector

The [attribute$="value"] selector is used to select elements whose attribute value ends with a specified value.

The following example selects all elements with a class attribute value that ends with "test":

note

The value does not have to be a whole word!

[class$="test"] {  
	background:  blue;  
}

CSS [attribute*="value"] Selector

The [attribute*="value"] selector is used to select elements whose attribute value contains a specified value.

The following example selects all elements with a class attribute value that contains "te":

note

The value does not have to be a whole word!

[class*="te"] {  
	background:  blue;  
}

Styling Forms

The attribute selectors can be useful for styling forms without class or ID:

input[type="text"] {  
	width:  150px;  
	display:  block;  
	margin-bottom:  10px;  
	background-color:  blue;  
}  
  
input[type="button"] {  
	width:  120px;  
	margin-left:  35px;  
	display:  block;  
}

Style HTML Elements With Specific Attributes​