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If you are closely related to programming, you are familiar with CSS and you know how annoying CSS position sticky not working error could be, but let us briefly explain CSS for our readers who are new to programming.
CSS is primarily used to style and layout web pages written in HTML or XHTML. It can be used to control the colors, fonts, spacing, and other visual elements of a website. CSS can be written in separate files with the .css file extension and linked to the HTML documents, or it can be included within the HTML document itself using a <style> tag. CSS can be used to style not only HTML pages but also XML documents, SVG, and XUL. Some applications also use CSS to style their user interface.
CSS can be used to create responsive designs that adapt to different screen sizes and devices, and it can be used to create animations and other dynamic effects on web pages. CSS position: sticky is a positioning value that allows an element to remain in a fixed position within the viewport as the user scrolls. Once the user scrolls to a certain point, the element “sticks” to the top or bottom of the viewport, and remains there as the user continues to scroll.
Here’s Mozilla’s guide on CSS.
To use position: sticky, you need to set the position property to “sticky” and also specify one of the top, bottom, left, or right properties to tell the browser where the element should stick to. If you have done all the instructions we mentioned correctly but you are still encountering the CSS position sticky not working error, let us explain how to fix it for you.
How to fix the CSS position sticky not working?
You might be encountering the CSS position sticky not working issue for a variety of reasons. You can check the items on the list below to resolve some typical or prospective problems when using it:
- Check for browser compatibility
- Make sure that you are specifying a threshold
- Control the Vendor Prefix for Safari
- Check if an Ancestor Element has an overflow property set or not
- Make sure the Parent Element is a Flexbox
Check for browser compatibility
It could be a good idea to confirm if you’re using a browser that supports position: sticky before looking for any fixes for the CSS position sticky not working issue. These browsers support the CSS position sticky line:
- Chrome
- Safari
- Firefox
- Internet Explorer
- Opera
- Edge
Make sure that you are specifying a threshold
A threshold must be provided in order for an element to be sticky, therefore at least one of the following attributes must have a value other than “auto”:
- top
- right
- bottom
- left
Control the Vendor Prefix for Safari
If you encounter the CSS position sticky not working issue while using Safari then you must include a vendor prefix for the property value to support Safari versions under 13.
Check if an Ancestor Element has an overflow property set or not
If any of the following overflow properties are set on the sticky element’s parent or ancestor, Position: sticky will not work.
- overflow: hidden
- overflow: scroll
- overflow: auto
Simply copy and paste the following code into your browser’s web developer console to locate all parent elements with the overflow property set to something other than visible:
let parent = document.querySelector(‘.sticky’).parentElement;
while (parent) {
const hasOverflow = getComputedStyle(parent).overflow;
if (hasOverflow !== ‘visible’) {
console.log(hasOverflow, parent);
}
parent = parent.parentElement;
}
Make sure the Parent Element is a Flexbox
If the sticky element’s parent is a flexbox, keep an eye out for either of the following two scenarios could be the reason why you are encountering the CSS position sticky not working issue:
- The sticky element has align-self: auto set (which is the default);
- The sticky element has align-self: stretch set.
If the Sticky Element Has align-self: auto Set:
In this instance, the align-self value would equal the align-items value of the parent causing you to encounter the CSS position sticky not working error. Therefore, if the parent has align-items: stretch set or align-items: normal set, the sticky element’s height will stretch to occupy the entire available area. The sticky element would be unable to scroll within the parent due to this.
If the Sticky Element Has align-self: stretch Set:
In this scenario, there would be no scrollable space around the sticky element because it would stretch to the parent’s height.
Here, we conclude our guide on how to fix the CSS position sticky not working error. We hope you were able to get rid of the error and continue with your code thanks to our guide. CSS position sticky not working error is just one of the many common challenges of software project outsourcing.
