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Shubham Tiwari
Shubham Tiwari

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Responsive Navbar without Javascript

Greetings to all. Today I'll demonstrate how to make a responsive navbar without Javascript that has a dropdown effect for mobile devices. The major CSS section will be explained, and the remaining code will be provided in the code pen at the end of this blog.

Let's get started...

I'll use the :has() selector for the toggle effect; you can see which browsers support it here.
https://caniuse.com/?search=has

HTML -

<header>
  <div class="logo">
    <h1 class="logo-text">LOGO</h1>
    <button class="hamburger-icon">
      <label for="dropdown">
        <i class="fa-solid fa-bars"></i>
        <i class="fa-solid fa-x"></i>
      </label>
      <input type="checkbox" id="dropdown" />
    </button>
  </div>
  <ul class="navigation">
    <li><a href="#">Home</a></li>
    <li><a href="#">About</a></li>
    <li><a href="#">Contact</a></li>
  </ul>
</header>
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  • I'm putting a checkbox field inside the button to create a toggling effect. The bars and cross icons will likewise be toggled by this checkbox.

CSS -

/* hiding the hamburger icon for the desktop view */
.hamburger-icon{
display:none;
border:none;
background-color:transparent;
}

/* Hiding the checkbox default styling */
.hamburger-icon input[type="checkbox"] {
  appearance: none;
}
.
.
.
/* targeting the element for the 
viewport less than 600px*/
@media screen and (max-width: 600px) {
/* Hiding the nav links with height and overflow */
 .navigation {
    height:0;
    overflow:hidden;
    flex-direction: column;
    align-items: center;
    transition:all 0.5s ease-in-out;
  }

/* It will put the Logo text at left end 
and Hamburger at the right end of the header */
.logo {
    display: flex;
    justify-content: space-between;
  }
}

/* Making the hamburger button visible */
.hamburger-icon {
    display: block;
  }

/* Initially hiding the cross icon */
.fa-x{
    display:none;
  }

/*determining whether the header contains a checkbox input that is checked before expanding the navigation's height to 100 pixels to make it visible.*/
  header:has(.hamburger-icon input[type="checkbox"]:checked) .navigation {
    margin-top: 1rem;
    height:100px;
  }

/* Hiding the bars icon on checkbox checked state */
  header:has(.hamburger-icon input[type="checkbox"]:checked) .fa-bars {
    display:none;
  }

/* Showing the cross icon on checkbox checked state */
  header:has(.hamburger-icon input[type="checkbox"]:checked) .fa-x {
    display:inline-block;
  }
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Codepen -

THANK YOU FOR CHECKING THIS POST
You can contact me on -
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/supremacism__shubh/
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/shubham-tiwari-b7544b193/
Email - shubhmtiwri00@gmail.com

^^You can help me by some donation at the link below Thank you👇👇 ^^
☕ --> https://www.buymeacoffee.com/waaduheck <--

Also check these posts as well
https://dev.to/shubhamtiwari909/css-iswherehas-and-not-2afd

https://dev.to/shubhamtiwari909/theme-changer-with-html-and-css-only-4144

https://dev.to/shubhamtiwari909/swiperjs-3802

https://dev.to/shubhamtiwari909/going-deep-in-array-sort-js-2n90

Top comments (33)

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violacase profile image
violacase

When you incorparate a polyfill when deploying you can be certain legacy browsers will work. Best way that work for me is to use PostCSS-plugins in the workspace.

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

I have to learn about PostCSS

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violacase profile image
violacase

Make it one of your near future learning goals. Developing is SO much more fun with a good eco system. (VSCode, Vite, PostCSS)
PostCCS is not too difficult. It does the hard work fór you!

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

I checked PostCSS and it's cool
Also I found it is used with TailwindCss as well.
I worked with Webpack but will check vite too.

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violacase profile image
violacase

Vite is GREAT for MANY good reasons. Check it out!
You'll never want to use webpack anymore. Webpack is old school. Don't believe me. Believe wat you'll encounter with Vite!

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

Yeah i would use it for sure
Thanks for the guidance

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violacase profile image
violacase

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year by the way,

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you too

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lissy93 profile image
Alicia Sykes • Edited

Nice article, but the burger button doesn't seem to work in the demo.
~Possibly it's a Chrome-only feature you're using, in which case adding a fallback would be good.~
Ah just seen the can i use link, probably best to avoid using :has as it's not at all well supported.

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

Are you using Firefox as your browser?

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lissy93 profile image
Alicia Sykes

Yeah

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lissy93 profile image
Alicia Sykes

You can use the @supports selector to add the functionality for the remaining browsers.

This would be important, as looks like :has isn't supported on many mobile browsers - and that's the only time the burger menu will be visible. So using it alone in this situation, is pretty much useless!

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

Yeah for the fallback i have to provide something as i didn't have used javascript, i have to build the logic in css for the same

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zoppatorsk profile image
Zoppatorsk

As seen on caniuse this do not work on firefox... and not on firefox mobile either. My own testing also shows it does not work on firefox but do work in chrome.

Similar way of doing it is possible but without using ":has". Would suggest using that or JS until browser support is up to snuff if going to put a site online. But yeah, interesting to see some new CSS stuff being used.

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari • Edited

Yeah that's why i put the caniuse link because the browser support is not vast for has selector But the power it gives in css ,
firefox and other browser will make it supportable in near future

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mstewartgallus profile image
Molly Stewart-Gallus

This isn't accessible.

You want to set aria-expanded and other attributes properly.

A details element almost works but still has problems.

Also please use a nav labelled by a heading and do not put interactive elements inside a button. Interactive elements inside a button are ignored by the accessibility tree.

Something like the following might be a better start towards a better nav menu.

<nav aria-labelledby=""menu-title">
  <header>
    <h2 id="menu-title">Menu</h2>
    <button id="menu-button" aria-expanded="false" aria-controls="navigation">Open/Close Menu</button>
  </header>
  <ul id="navigation">
    <li><a href="#">Home</a></li>
    <li><a href="#">About</a></li>
    <li><a href="#">Contact</a></li>
  </ul>
</nav>
~~~
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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

Sure i will take care of it

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raibtoffoletto profile image
Raí B. Toffoletto

Nicely done! Kudos 🎉 Hopefully Firefox will stop this silliness of not supporting :has out of the box

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

Yeah right 😂

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stevedev profile image
Stephen Gachoki

Great creation 👍👌

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

Thank you

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yoquiale profile image
Alex

You should use min-width media queries instead, it makes coding responsive stuff easier.

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

Yeah that's also good

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telegramtracker profile image
Telegram Tracker

good idea!

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

Thanks

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immayurpanchal profile image
Mayur Panchal

Interesting! Using checkbox to create the toggle 🔥

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

Thank you

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janosongithub profile image
JANOSongithub

Thank You! Nice work.

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

Welcome

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jolebowski profile image
jolebowski

You can use media queries

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

I have used it in the example you check

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shubhamtiwari909 profile image
Shubham Tiwari

Sure i will check it

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d7460n profile image
D7460N

Great job! Thanks for sharing.