CSS Combinators

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CSS Combinators
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CSS Combinators
A combinator is something that explains the relationship between the selectors.

A CSS selector can contain more than one simple selector. Between the simple selectors, we can include a combinator.

There are four different combinators in CSS3:

descendant selector (space)
child selector (>)
adjacent sibling selector (+)
general sibling selector (~)
Descendant Selector
The descendant selector matches all elements that are descendants of a specified element.

The following example selects all <p> elements inside <div> elements:

Example
div p {
    background-color: yellow;
}
»
Child Selector
The child selector selects all elements that are the immediate children of a specified element.

The following example selects all <p> elements that are immediate children of a <div> element:

Example
div > p {
    background-color: yellow;
}
»
Adjacent Sibling Selector
The adjacent sibling selector selects all elements that are the adjacent siblings of a specified element.

Sibling elements must have the same parent element, and "adjacent" means "immediately following".

The following example selects all <p> elements that are placed immediately after <div> elements:

Example
div + p {
    background-color: yellow;
}
»
General Sibling Selector
The general sibling selector selects all elements that are siblings of a specified element.

The following example selects all <p> elements that are siblings of <div> elements:

Example
div ~ p {
    background-color: yellow;
}
»
Test Yourself with Exercises!
Exercise 1 »  Exercise 2 »  Exercise 3 »  Exercise 4 »


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