text-emphasis

The text-emphasis CSS property is a shorthand property for setting text-emphasis-style and text-emphasis-color in one declaration. This property will apply the specified emphasis mark to each character of the element's text, except separator characters, like spaces, and control characters.

The text-emphasis property is quite different from text-decoration. The text-decoration property does not inherit, and the decoration specified is applied across the whole element. However, text-emphasis does inherit, which means it is possible to change emphasis marks for descendents.

The size of the emphasis symbol, like ruby symbols, is about 50% of the size of the font, and text-emphasis may affect line height when the current leading is not enough for the marks.

Initial value	as each of the properties of the shorthand: text-emphasis-style: none text-emphasis-color: currentColor
Applies to	all elements
Inherited	no
Media	visual
Computed value	as each of the properties of the shorthand: text-emphasis-style: as specified text-emphasis-color: If the value is translucent, the computed value will be the rgba() corresponding one. If it isn't, it will be the rgb() corresponding one. The transparent keyword maps to rgba(0,0,0,0).
Animatable	as each of the properties of the shorthand: text-emphasis-color: yes, as a color text-emphasis-style: no
Canonical order	order of appearance in the formal grammar of the values

Syntax

/* Initial value */
text-emphasis: none; /* No emphasis marks */

/* <string> value */
text-emphasis: 'x';
text-emphasis: '点';
text-emphasis: '\25B2';
text-emphasis: '*' #555;
text-emphasis: 'foo'; /* Should NOT use. It may be computed to or rendered as 'f' only */

/* Keywords value */
text-emphasis: filled;
text-emphasis: open;
text-emphasis: filled sesame;
text-emphasis: open sesame;

/* Keywords value combined with a color */
text-emphasis: filled sesame #555;

/* Global values */
text-emphasis: inherit;
text-emphasis: initial;
text-emphasis: unset;

Values

none

No emphasis marks.

filled

The shape is filled with solid color. If neither filled nor open is present, this is the default.

open

The shape is hollow.

dot

Display small circles as marks. The filled dot is '•' (U+2022), and the open dot is '◦' (U+25E6).

circle

Display large circles as marks. The filled circle is '●' (U+25CF), and the open circle is '○' (U+25CB). This is the default shape in horizontal writing modes when no other shape is given.

double-circle

Display double circles as marks. The filled double-circle is '◉' (U+25C9), and the open double-circle is '◎' (U+25CE).

triangle

Display triangles as marks. The filled triangle is '▲' (U+25B2), and the open triangle is '△' (U+25B3).

sesame

Display sesames as marks. The filled sesame is '﹅' (U+FE45), and the open sesame is '﹆' (U+FE46). This is the default shape in vertical writing modes when no other shape is given.

<string>

Display the given string as marks. Authors should not specify more than one character in <string>. The UA may truncate or ignore strings consisting of more than one grapheme cluster.

<color>

Defines the color of the mark. If no color is present, it defaults to currentColor.

Formal syntax

<'text-emphasis-style'> || <'text-emphasis-color'>

Examples

h2 {
  /* text-emphasis: shape color; */
  text-emphasis: triangle #555;
}

Specifications

Specification	Status	Comment
CSS Text Decoration Level 3 The definition of 'text-emphasis' in that specification.	Candidate Recommendation	Initial definition

Browser compatibility

[1] In Firefox 45, it wasn't activated by default: in about:config, the user has to set the preference layout.css.text-emphasis.enabled to true. Activated by default in Firefox 46, this preference was removed in Firefox 49.

See also

• The longhand properties text-emphasis-style, text-emphasis-color.
• The text-emphasis-position property allowing to define the position of the emphasis marks.