CSS text-overflow: ellipsis; not working?

Overflow Problem Overview

I don't know why this simple CSS isn't working...

.app a {
  height: 18px;
  width: 140px;
  padding: 0;
  overflow: hidden;
  position: relative;
  margin: 0 5px 0 5px;
  text-align: center;
  text-decoration: none;
  text-overflow: ellipsis;
  white-space: nowrap;
  color: #000;
}

<div class="app">
  <a href="">Test Test Test Test Test Test</a>
</div>

Should cut off around the 4th "Test"

Overflow Solutions

Solution 1 - Overflow

text-overflow:ellipsis; only works when the following are true:

The element's width must be constrained in px (pixels). Width in % (percentage) won't work.
The element must have overflow:hidden and white-space:nowrap set.

The reason you're having problems here is because the width of your a element isn't constrained. You do have a width setting, but because the element is set to display:inline (i.e. the default) it is ignoring it, and nothing else is constraining its width either.

You can fix this by doing one of the following:

Set the element to display:inline-block or display:block (probably the former, but depends on your layout needs).
Set one of its container elements to display:block and give that element a fixed width or max-width.
Set the element to float:left or float:right (probably the former, but again, either should have the same effect as far as the ellipsis is concerned).

I'd suggest display:inline-block, since this will have the minimum collateral impact on your layout; it works very much like the display:inline that it's using currently as far as the layout is concerned, but feel free to experiment with the other points as well; I've tried to give as much info as possible to help you understand how these things interact together; a large part of understanding CSS is about understanding how various styles work together.

Here's a snippet with your code, with a display:inline-block added, to show how close you were.

.app a {
  height: 18px;
  width: 140px;
  padding: 0;
  overflow: hidden;
  position: relative;
  display: inline-block;
  margin: 0 5px 0 5px;
  text-align: center;
  text-decoration: none;
  text-overflow: ellipsis;
  white-space: nowrap;
  color: #000;
}

<div class="app">
  <a href="">Test Test Test Test Test Test</a>
</div>

Useful references:

Solution 2 - Overflow

The accepted answer is awesome. However, you can still use % width and attain text-overflow: ellipsis. The solution is simple:

display: inline-block; /* for inline elements e.g. span, strong, em etc */
text-overflow: ellipsis;
width: calc(80%); /* The trick is here! */

It seems whenever you use calc, the final value is rendered in absolute pixels, which consequentially converts 80% to something like 800px for a 1000px-width container. Therefore, instead of using width: [YOUR PERCENT]%, use width: calc([YOUR PERCENT]%).

Solution 3 - Overflow

So if you reach this question because you're having trouble trying to get the ellipsis working inside a display: flex container, try adding min-width: 0 to the outmost container that's overflowing its parent even though you already set a overflow: hidden to it and see how that works for you.

More details and a working example on this codepen by aj-foster. Totally did the trick in my case.

Solution 4 - Overflow

Include the four lines written after the info for ellipsis to work

.app a
{
 color: #fff;
 font: bold 15px/18px Arial;
 height: 18px;
 margin: 0 5px 0 5px;
 padding: 0;
 position: relative;
 text-align: center;
 text-decoration: none;
 width: 140px;

 /* 
 Note: The Below 4 Lines are necessary for ellipsis to work.
 */

 display: block;/* Change it as per your requirement. */
 overflow: hidden;
 text-overflow: ellipsis;
 white-space: nowrap;
}

Solution 5 - Overflow

I faced the same issue and it seems like none of the solution above works for Safari. For non-safari browser, this works just fine:

display: block; /* or in-line block according to your requirement */
overflow: hidden;
white-space: nowrap;
text-overflow: ellipsis;

For Safari, this is the one that works for me. Note that the media query to check if the browser is Safari might change over time, so just tinker with the media query if it doesn't work for you. With line-clamp property, it would also be possible to have multiple lines in the web with ellipsis, see here.

// Media-query for Safari-only browser.
@media not all and (min-resolution: 0.001dpcm) {
  @media {
    -webkit-line-clamp: 1;
    -webkit-box-orient: vertical;
    display: -webkit-box;
    white-space: normal;
  }
}

Solution 6 - Overflow

I have been having this problem and I wanted a solution that could easily work with dynamic widths. The solution use css grid. This is how the code looks like:

.parent {
  display: grid;
  grid-template-columns: auto 1fr;
}

.dynamic-width-child {
  white-space: nowrap;
  text-overflow: ellipsis;
  overflow: hidden;
}

.fixed-width-child {
  white-space: nowrap;
}

<div class="parent">
  <div class="dynamic-width-child">
    iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii asdfhlhlafh;lshd;flhsd;lhfaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
  </div>
  <div class="fixed-width-child">Why?-Zed</div>
</div>

Solution 7 - Overflow

Add display: block; or display: inline-block; to your #User_Apps_Content .DLD_App a

demo

Solution 8 - Overflow

Also make sure word-wrap is set to normal for IE10 and below.

The standards referenced below define this property's behavior as being dependent on the setting of the "text-wrap" property. However, wordWrap settings are always effective in Windows Internet Explorer because Internet Explorer does not support the "text-wrap" property.

Hence in my case, word-wrap was set to break-word (inherited or by default?) causing text-overflow to work in FF and Chrome, but not in IE.

ms info on word-wrap property

Solution 9 - Overflow

anchor,span... tags are inline elements by default, In case of inline elements width property doesn't works. So you have to convert your element to either inline-block or block level elements

Solution 10 - Overflow

In bootstrap 4, you can add a .text-truncate class to truncate the text with an ellipsis.

<script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/2.1.1/jquery.min.js"></script>
<link href="https://stackpath.bootstrapcdn.com/bootstrap/4.1.3/css/bootstrap.min.css" rel="stylesheet" />
<script src="https://stackpath.bootstrapcdn.com/bootstrap/4.1.3/js/bootstrap.min.js"></script>

<!-- Inline level -->
<span class="d-inline-block text-truncate" style="max-width: 250px;">
  The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
</span>

Solution 11 - Overflow

MUST contain

  text-overflow: ellipsis;
  white-space: nowrap;
  overflow: hidden;

MUST NOT contain

display: inline

SHOULD contain

position: sticky

Solution 12 - Overflow

You just add one line css:

.app a {
   display: inline-block;
}

Solution 13 - Overflow

Please also ensure, that the immediate enclosing element has a fixed width, and the span where you want to apply ellipsis , has a display:block

Solution 14 - Overflow

I had to make some long descriptions ellipse(take only one lane) while being responsive, so my solution was to let the text wrap(instead of white-space: nowrap) and instead of fixed width I added fixed height:

span {
  display: inline-block;
  line-height: 1rem;
  height: 1rem;
  overflow: hidden;
  // OPTIONAL LINES
  width: 75%;
  background: green;
  //  white-space: normal; default
}

<span>
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit. Commodi quia quod reprehenderit saepe sit. Animi deleniti distinctio dolorum iste molestias reiciendis saepe. Ea eius ex, ipsam iusto laudantium natus obcaecati quas rem repellat temporibus! A alias at, atque deserunt dignissimos dolor earum, eligendi eveniet exercitationem natus non, odit sint sit tempore voluptate. Commodi culpa ex facere id minima nihil nulla omnis praesentium quasi quia quibusdam recusandae repellat sequi ullam, voluptates. Aliquam commodi debitis delectus magnam nulla, omnis sequi sint unde voluptas voluptatum. Adipisci aliquam deserunt dolor enim facilis libero, maxime molestias, nemo neque non nostrum placeat reprehenderit, rerum ullam vel? A atque autem consectetur cum, doloremque doloribus fugiat hic id iste nemo nesciunt officia quaerat quibusdam quidem quisquam similique sit tempora vel. Accusamus aspernatur at au
</span>

Solution 15 - Overflow

Just add in the div containing that paragraph

white-space: nowrap 
width: 50px; 
overflow: hidden;
text-overflow: ellipsis; 
border: 1px solid #000000;

Solution 16 - Overflow

> Write these in your css rule.

display: block; /* or in-line block according to your requirement */
overflow: hidden;
white-space: nowrap;
text-overflow: ellipsis;

Solution 17 - Overflow

You can also add float:left; inside this selector:

#User_Apps_Content .DLD_App a

Content Type	Original Author	Original Content on Stackoverflow
Question	ChristopherStrydom	View Question on Stackoverflow
Solution 1 - Overflow	Spudley	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 2 - Overflow	Supreme Dolphin	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 3 - Overflow	Herick	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 4 - Overflow	Manoj Selvin	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 5 - Overflow	alextanhongpin	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 6 - Overflow	YulePale	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 7 - Overflow	Bhojendra Rauniyar	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 8 - Overflow	Tim Vermaelen	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 9 - Overflow	santhoshkumar	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 10 - Overflow	Penny Liu	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 11 - Overflow	NVRM	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 12 - Overflow	Sanjib Debnath	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 13 - Overflow	Bidisha Das	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 14 - Overflow	T04435	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 15 - Overflow	Atul Tiwaree	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 16 - Overflow	Siraj Alam	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 17 - Overflow	Shabbir Lakdawala	View Answer on Stackoverflow