CSS technique for a horizontal line with words in the middle

Html Problem Overview

I'm trying to make a horizontal rule with some text in the middle. For example:

----------------------------------- my title here -----------------------------

Is there a way to do that in CSS? Without all the "-" dashes obviously.

Html Solutions

Solution 1 - Html

This is roughly how I'd do it: the line is created by setting a border-bottom on the containing h2 then giving the h2 a smaller line-height. The text is then put in a nested span with a non-transparent background.

h2 {
   width: 100%; 
   text-align: center; 
   border-bottom: 1px solid #000; 
   line-height: 0.1em;
   margin: 10px 0 20px; 
} 

h2 span { 
    background:#fff; 
    padding:0 10px; 
}

<h2><span>THIS IS A TEST</span></h2>
<p>this is some content other</p>

I tested in Chrome only, but there's no reason it shouldn't work in other browsers.

JSFiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/7jGHS/

Solution 2 - Html

After trying different solutions, I have come with one valid for different text widths, any possible background and without adding extra markup.

h1 {
  overflow: hidden;
  text-align: center;
}

h1:before,
h1:after {
  background-color: #000;
  content: "";
  display: inline-block;
  height: 1px;
  position: relative;
  vertical-align: middle;
  width: 50%;
}

h1:before {
  right: 0.5em;
  margin-left: -50%;
}

h1:after {
  left: 0.5em;
  margin-right: -50%;
}

<h1>Heading</h1>
<h1>This is a longer heading</h1>

I tested it in IE8, IE9, Firefox and Chrome. You can check it here http://jsfiddle.net/Puigcerber/vLwDf/1/

Solution 3 - Html

Here is Flex based solution.

Today

h1 {
  display: flex;
  flex-direction: row;
}
h1:before, h1:after{
  content: "";
  flex: 1 1;
  border-bottom: 1px solid;
  margin: auto;
}

h1:before { margin-right: 10px } h1:after { margin-left: 10px }

JSFiddle: https://jsfiddle.net/j0y7uaqL/

Solution 4 - Html

Shortest and best method:

span:after,
span:before{
    content:"\00a0\00a0\00a0\00a0\00a0";
    text-decoration:line-through;
}

<span> your text </span>

Solution 5 - Html

Ok, this one is more complicated but it works in everything but IE<8

<div><span>text TEXT</span></div>

div {
    text-align: center;
    position: relative;
}
span {
    display: inline-block;    
}
span:before,
span:after {
    border-top: 1px solid black;
    display: block;
    height: 1px;
    content: " ";
    width: 40%;
    position: absolute;
    left: 0;
    top: 1.2em;
}
span:after {
   right: 0;  
   left: auto; 
}

The :before and :after elements are positioned absolutely so we can pull one to the left and one to the right. Also, the width (40% in this case) is very dependent of the width of the text inside.. have to think about a solution for that. At least the top: 1.2em makes sure the lines stay more or less in the center of the text even if you have different font size.

It does seem to work well though: http://jsfiddle.net/tUGrf/3/

Solution 6 - Html

edit (09/2020)

display:flex method seems to be today the most solid and easiest to set in action.

Wrote Mar 17 '15 at 17:06:

for later(nowdays ) browser , display:flex and pseudo-elements makes it easy to draw without extra markup.

border-style, box-shadow and even background helps too for the makeup if you need it fancy or ugly.

h1 {margin-top:50px;
  display:flex;
  background:linear-gradient(to left,gray,lightgray,white,yellow,turquoise);;
}
h1:before, h1:after {
  color:white;
  content:'';
  flex:1;
  border-bottom:groove 2px;
  margin:auto 0.25em;
  box-shadow: 0 -1px ;/* ou 0 1px si border-style:ridge */
}

<h1>side lines via flex</h1>

ressource (added 09/2020):

https://css-tricks.com/snippets/css/a-guide-to-flexbox/ (see flex/flex-grow used here)
https://css-tricks.com/the-peculiar-magic-of-flexbox-and-auto-margins/ (margin:auto 0.25em; used here )

Solution 7 - Html

.hr-sect {
	display: flex;
	flex-basis: 100%;
	align-items: center;
	color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.35);
	margin: 8px 0px;
}
.hr-sect::before,
.hr-sect::after {
	content: "";
	flex-grow: 1;
	background: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.35);
	height: 1px;
	font-size: 0px;
	line-height: 0px;
	margin: 0px 8px;
}

<div class="hr-sect">Text</div>

Solution 8 - Html

   <div class="flex items-center">
      <div class="flex-grow bg bg-gray-300 h-0.5"></div>
      <div class="flex-grow-0 mx-5 text dark:text-white">or</div>
      <div class="flex-grow bg bg-gray-300 h-0.5"></div>
   </div>

For all the tailwind lovers out there. Inspired by WellSpring's answer

Solution 9 - Html

<div><span>text TEXT</span></div>

div { 
  height: 1px; 
  border-top: 1px solid black; 
  text-align: center; 
  position: relative; 
}
span { 
  position: relative; 
  top: -.7em; 
  background: white; 
  display: inline-block; 
}

Give the span a padding to make more space between the text and the line.

Example: http://jsfiddle.net/tUGrf/

Solution 10 - Html

I've been looking around for some solutions for this simple decoration and I've found quite a few ones, some weird, some even with JS to calculate the height of the font and bla,bla,bla, then I've read the one on this post and read a comment from thirtydot speaking about fieldset and legend and I thought that was it.

I'm overriding those 2 elements styles, I guess you could copy the W3C standards for them and include it on your .middle-line-text class (or whatever you want to call it) but this is what I did:

<fieldset class="featured-header">
    <legend>Your text goes here</legend>
</fieldset>

<style>
.featured-header{
    border-bottom: none;
    border-left: none;
    border-right: none;
    text-align: center;
 }

.featured-header legend{
	-webkit-padding-start: 8px; /* It sets the whitespace between the line and the text */
    -webkit-padding-end: 8px; 
	background: transparent; /** It's cool because you don't need to fill your bg-color as you would need to in some of the other examples that you can find (: */
	font-weight: normal; /* I preffer the text to be regular instead of bold  */
	color: YOU_CHOOSE;
}	

</style>

Here's the fiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/legnaleama/3t7wjpa2/

I've played with the border styles and it also works in Android ;) (Tested on kitkat 4.XX)

EDIT:

Following Bekerov Artur's idea which is a nice option too, I've changed the .png base64 image to create the stroke with an .SVG so you can render in any resolution and also change the colour of the element without any other software involved :)

/* SVG solution based on Bekerov Artur */
/* Flexible solution, scalable, adaptable and also color customizable*/
.stroke {
background-image: url("data:image/svg+xml;utf8,<svg xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg' xmlns:xlink='http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink' x='0px' y='0px' width='1px' height='1px' viewBox='0 0 1 1' enable-background='new 0 0 1 1' fill='%23ff6600' xml:space='preserve'><rect width='1' height='1'/></svg>");
background-repeat: repeat-x;
background-position: left;
text-align: center;
}
.stroke h3 {
background-color: #ffffff;
margin: 0 auto;
padding:0 10px;
display: inline-block;
font-size: 66px;
}

Solution 11 - Html

This gives you fixed length for the lines, but works great. The lines lengths are controlled by adding or taking '\00a0' (unicode space).

h1:before, h1:after {
  content:'\00a0\00a0\00a0\00a0';
  text-decoration: line-through;
  margin: auto 0.5em;
}

<h1>side lines</h1>

Solution 12 - Html

Solution for IE8 and newer...

Issues worth noting:

Using background-color to mask a border might not be the best solution. If you have a complex (or unknown) background color (or image), masking will ultimately fail. Also, if you resize the text, you'll notice that white background color (or whatever you set) will start covering up the text on the line above (or below).

You also don't want to "guesstimate" how wide the the sections are either, because it makes the styles very inflexible and almost impossible to implement on a responsive site where the width of the content is changing.

Solution:

(View JSFiddle)

Instead of "masking" a border with a background-color, use your display property.

HTML

<div class="group">
    <div class="item line"></div>
    <div class="item text">This is a test</div>
    <div class="item line"></div>
</div>

CSS

.group { display: table; width: 100%; }
.item { display: table-cell; }
.text { white-space: nowrap; width: 1%; padding: 0 10px; }
.line { border-bottom: 1px solid #000; position: relative; top: -.5em; }

Resize your text by placing your font-size property on the .group element.

Limitations:

No multi-line text. Single lines only.
HTML markup isn't as elegant
top property on .line element needs to be half of line-height. So, if you have a line-height of 1.5em, then the top should be -.75em. This is a limitation because it's not automated, and if you are applying these styles on elements with different line-heights, then you might need to reapply your line-height style.

For me, these limitations outweigh the "issues" I noted at the beginning of my answer for most implementations.

Solution 13 - Html

CSS grids to the rescue

Similar to the flex answers above, this can also be done using CSS Grids. This gives you more scope to offset the title, and a more simple way of expanding the gap between the lines (using grid-template-columns) and the content (using grid-gap).

The benefits of this method over flex methods is the ease of being able to offset the lines, and additionally only needing to add in a gap between columns once (not twice, for each the :before and :after pseudo element). It is also much more syntactically cleaner and obvious IMO.

h1 {
  display: grid;
  grid-template-columns: 1fr auto 1fr;
  align-items: center;
  grid-gap: 1rem;
}

h1:before,
h1:after {
  content: "";
  display: block;
  border-top: 2px solid currentColor;
}

h1.offset {
  grid-template-columns: 1fr auto 3fr;
}

h1.biggap {
  grid-gap: 4rem;
}

<h1>This is a title</h1>

<h1 class="offset">Offset title</h1>

<h1 class="biggap">Gappy title</h1>

<h1>
  <span>Multi-line<br />title</span>
</h1>

Solution 14 - Html

I use a table layout to fill the sides dynamically and 0-height, absolute-position divs for dynamic vertical positioning:

no hard-coded dimensions
no images
no pseudo-elements
respects background
control bar appearance

https://jsfiddle.net/eq5gz5xL/18/

I found that a little below true center looks best with text; this can be adjusted where the 55% is (taller height makes the bar lower). The appearance of the line can be changed where the border-bottom is.

HTML:

<div class="title">
  <div class="title-row">
    <div class="bar-container">
      <div class="bar"></div>
    </div>
    <div class="text">
      Title
    </div>
    <div class="bar-container">
      <div class="bar"></div>
    </div>
  </div>
</div>

CSS:

.title{
  display: table;
  width: 100%
  background: linear-gradient(to right, white, lightgray);
}
.title-row{
  display: table-row;
}
.bar-container {
  display: table-cell;
  position: relative;
  width: 50%;
}
.bar {
  position: absolute;
  width: 100%;
  top: 55%;
  border-bottom: 1px solid black;
}
.text {
  display: table-cell;
  padding-left: 5px;
  padding-right: 5px;
  font-size: 36px;
}

Solution 15 - Html

Not to beat a dead horse, but I was searching for a solution, ended up here, and was myself not satisfied with the options, not least for some reason I wasn't able to get the provided solutions here to work well for me. (Likely due to errors on my part...) But I've been playing with flexbox and here's something I did get to work for myself.

Some of the settings are hard-wired, but only for purposes of demonstration. I'd think this solution ought to work in just about any modern browser. Just remove/adjust the fixed settings for the .flex-parent class, adjust colors/text/stuff and (I hope) you'll be as happy as I am with this approach.

HTML:

.flex-parent {
  display: flex;
  width: 300px;
  height: 20px;
  align-items: center;
}

.flex-child-edge {
  flex-grow: 2;
  height: 1px;
  background-color: #000;
  border: 1px #000 solid;
}
.flex-child-text {
  flex-basis: auto;
  flex-grow: 0;
  margin: 0px 5px 0px 5px;
  text-align: center;
}

<div class="flex-parent">
  <div class="flex-child-edge"></div>
  <div class="flex-child-text">I found this simpler!</div>
  <div class="flex-child-edge"></div>
</div>

I also saved my solution here: https://jsfiddle.net/Wellspring/wupj1y1a/1/

Solution 16 - Html

If anyone is wondering how to set the heading such that it appears with a fixed distance to the left side (and not centered as presented above), I figured that out by modifying @Puigcerber's code.

h1 {
  white-space: nowrap;
  overflow: hidden;
}

h1:before, 
h1:after {
  background-color: #000;
  content: "";
  display: inline-block;
  height: 1px;
  position: relative;
  vertical-align: middle;
}

h1:before {
  right: 0.3em;
  width: 50px;
}

h1:after {
  left: 0.3em;
  width: 100%;
}

Here the JSFiddle.

Solution 17 - Html

h6 {
    font: 14px sans-serif;
    margin-top: 20px;
    text-align: center;
    text-transform: uppercase;
    font-weight: 900;
}

    h6.background {
        position: relative;
        z-index: 1;
        margin-top: 0%;
        width:85%;
        margin-left:6%;
    }

        h6.background span {
            background: #fff;
            padding: 0 15px;
        }

        h6.background:before {
            border-top: 2px solid #dfdfdf;
            content: "";
            margin: 0 auto; /* this centers the line to the full width specified */
            position: absolute; /* positioning must be absolute here, and relative positioning must be applied to the parent */
            top: 50%;
            left: 0;
            right: 0;
            bottom: 0;
            width: 95%;
            z-index: -1;
        }

this will help you

between line

Solution 18 - Html

Horizontal and Vertical line with words in the middle

.box{
    background-image: url("https://i.stack.imgur.com/N39wV.jpg");
    width: 350px;
    padding: 10px;
}

/*begin first box*/
.first{
    width: 300px;
    height: 100px;
    margin: 10px;
    border-width: 0 2px 0 2px;
    border-color: red;
    border-style: solid;
    position: relative;
}

.first span {
    position: absolute;
    display: flex;
    right: 0;
    left: 0;
    align-items: center;
}
.first .foo{
    top: -8px;
}
.first .bar{
    bottom: -8.5px;
}
.first span:before{
    margin-right: 15px;
}
.first span:after {
    margin-left: 15px;
}
.first span:before , .first span:after {
    content: ' ';
    height: 2px;
    background: red;
    display: block;
    width: 50%;
}


/*begin second box*/
.second{
    width: 300px;
    height: 100px;
    margin: 10px;
    border-width: 2px 0 2px 0;
    border-color: red;
    border-style: solid;
    position: relative;
}

.second span {
    position: absolute;
    top: 0;
    bottom: 0;
    display: flex;
    flex-direction: column;
    align-items: center;
}
.second .foo{
    left: -15px;
}
.second .bar{
    right: -15.5px;
}
.second span:before{
    margin-bottom: 15px;
}
.second span:after {
    margin-top: 15px;
}
.second span:before , .second span:after {
    content: ' ';
    width: 2px;
    background: red;
    display: block;
    height: 50%;
}

<div class="box">
    <div class="first">
        <span class="foo">FOO</span>
        <span class="bar">BAR</span>
    </div>

   <br>

    <div class="second">
        <span class="foo">FOO</span>
        <span class="bar">BAR</span>
    </div>
</div>

This is also answered in https://stackoverflow.com/a/57279326/6569224

Solution 19 - Html

This code will work properly:

/* پخش زنده*/
  .div-live {
    text-align: center;
}
.span-live {
    display: inline-block;
    color: #b5b5b5;
  
}
.span-live:before,
.span-live:after {
    border-top: 1px solid #b5b5b5;
    display: block;
    height: 1px;
    content: " ";
    width: 30%;
    position: absolute;
    left: 0;
    top: 3rem;


}
.span-live:after {
   right: 0;
   left: auto;
}

  <div class="div-live">
            <span class="span-live">پخش زنده</span>

    </div>

Solution 20 - Html

I went for a simpler approach:

HTML

<div class="box">
  <h1 class="text">OK THEN LETS GO</h1>
  <hr class="line" />
</div>

CSS

.box {
  align-items: center;
  background: #ff7777;
  display: flex;
  height: 100vh;
  justify-content: center;
}

.line {
  border: 5px solid white;
  display: block;
  width: 100vw;
}

.text {
  background: #ff7777;
  color: white;
  font-family: sans-serif;
  font-size: 2.5rem;
  padding: 25px 50px;
  position: absolute;
}

Result

Solution 21 - Html

If you are using React with Styled Components. I found that is more easy to just separate elements. Is not the "amazing solution" but it works.

import React from 'react';
import styled from "@emotion/styled";

const Container = styled.div`
  padding-top: 210px;
  padding-left: 50px;  
  display: inline-flex;
`

const Title1 = styled.div`
  position: absolute;
  font-size: 25px;
  left:40px;
  color: white;
  margin-top: -17px;
  padding-left: 40px;
`

const Title2 = styled.div`
  position: absolute;
  font-size: 25px;
  left:1090px;
  color: white;
  margin-top: -17px;
  padding-left: 40px;
`

const Line1 = styled.div`
  width: 20px;
  border: solid darkgray 1px;
  margin-right: 90px;
`
const Line2 = styled.div`
  width: 810px;
  border: solid darkgray 1px;
  margin-right: 126px;
`
const Line3 = styled.div`
  width: 178px;
  border: solid darkgray 1px;
`


const Titulos = () => {
    return (
        <Container>
            <Line1/>
            <Title1>
                FEATURED
            </Title1>
            <Line2/>
            <Line1/>
            <Title2>
                EXCLUSIVE
            </Title2>
            <Line3/>
        </Container>
    );
};

export default Titulos;

Result:

Solution 22 - Html

One element dynamic solution with transparency:

h2 {
  display:table; /* fit content width*/
  margin:20px auto; /* center*/
  padding:0 10px; /* control the space between the text and the line */
  box-shadow:0 0 0 100px red; /* control the line length and color here */
  --s:2px; /* control the line thickness*/
  clip-path:
    polygon(0 0,100% 0,
        99%     calc(50% - var(--s)/2),
        200vmax calc(50% - var(--s)/2), 
        200vmax calc(50% + var(--s)/2),
        99%     calc(50% + var(--s)/2),
      100% 100%,0 100%,
        1px     calc(50% + var(--s)/2),
       -200vmax calc(50% + var(--s)/2),
       -200vmax calc(50% - var(--s)/2),
        1px     calc(50% - var(--s)/2));
}

body {
  background: pink;
}

<h2>a Title here </h2>
<h2 style="box-shadow:0 0 0 100vmax blue;">Title</h2>
<h2 style="box-shadow:0 0 0 200px green;--s:5px">Another title Title</h2>

Solution 23 - Html

Just in case anyone wants to, IMHO the best solution using CSS is by a flexbox.

Here is an example:

.kw-dvp-HorizonalButton {
    color: #0078d7;
    display:flex;
    flex-wrap:nowrap;
    align-items:center;
}
.kw-dvp-HorizonalButton:before, .kw-dvp-HorizonalButton:after {
    background-color: #0078d7;
    content: "";
    display: inline-block;
    float:left;
    height:1px;
}
.kw-dvp-HorizonalButton:before {
    order:1;
    flex-grow:1;
    margin-right:8px;
}
.kw-dvp-HorizonalButton:after {
    order: 3;
    flex-grow: 1;
    margin-left: 8px;
}
.kw-dvp-HorizonalButton * {
    order: 2;
}

    <div class="kw-dvp-HorizonalButton">
        <span>hello</span>
    </div>

This should always result in a perfectly centered aligned content with a line to the left and right, with an easy to control margin between the line and your content.

It creates a line element before and after your top control and set them to order 1,3 in your flex container while setting your content as order 2 (go in the middle). giving the before/after a grow of 1 will make them consume the most vacant space equally while keeping your content centered.

Hope this helps!

Solution 24 - Html

No pseudo-element, no additional element. Only single div:

I used some CSS variables to control easily.

div {
  --border-height: 2px;
  --border-color: #000;
  background: linear-gradient(var(--border-color),var(--border-color)) 0% 50%/ calc(50% - (var(--space) / 2)) var(--border-height),
              linear-gradient(var(--border-color),var(--border-color)) 100% 50%/ calc(50% - (var(--space) / 2)) var(--border-height);
  background-repeat:no-repeat;
  text-align:center;
}

<div style="--space: 100px">Title</div>
<div style="--space: 50px;--border-color: red;--border-height:1px;">Title</div>
<div style="--space: 150px;--border-color: green;">Longer Text</div>

But the above method is not dynamic. You have to change the --space variable according to the text length.

Solution 25 - Html

This might go a bit beyond the question, but I believe this does help others with similar problems.

If you require multiple cells and do not want to specify a background color explicitly you have to use markup for every part of the line.

This allows you to use a full flex line to position the elements whereever and is usefull for e.g. expander

.title-hr {
  width: 100%;
  vertical-align: middle;
  align-items: center;
  text-align: start;
  display: flex;
}

.title-hr>span {
  padding: 0 0.4em;
}
  
.title-hr>.hr {
  border-bottom: 1px solid #777;
  line-height: 0.1em;
  margin: 0.34em 0 0.35em;
  flex: 1 1 auto;
}

.title-hr>.hr.fix {
  flex: 0 1 auto;
}

<div class="title-hr">
  <span>+</span>
  <span class="hr fix"></span>
  <span>Title</span>
  <span class="hr"></span>
</div>

Solution 26 - Html

I am not too sure, but you could try using a horizontal rule and pushing the text above its top margin. You will need a fixed width on your paragraph tag and a background too. It's a little hacky and I don't know if it will work on all browsers, and you need to set the negative margin based on the size of the font. Works on chrome though.

<style>   
 p{ margin-top:-20px; background:#fff; width:20px;}
</style>

<hr><p>def</p>

Solution 27 - Html

I have tried most of the ways suggested but ends with some problems like full width, or Not suitable for dynamic content. Finally i modified a code, and works perfectly. This example code will draw those lines before and after, and it is flexible in content change. Center aligned too.