Spacing
Bootstrap includes a wide range of shorthand responsive margin, padding, and gap utility classes to modify an element’s appearance.
Spacing on BootstrapMargin and padding
Assign responsive-friendly margin or padding values to an element or a subset of its sides with shorthand classes. Includes support for individual properties, all properties, and vertical and horizontal properties. Classes are built from a default Sass map ranging from .25rem to 3rem.
Using the CSS Grid layout module? Consider using the gap utility
Notations
Spacing utilities that apply to all breakpoints, from xs
to xxl
, have no breakpoint abbreviation in them. This is because those classes are applied from min-width: 0
and up, and thus are not bound by a media query. The remaining breakpoints, however, do include a breakpoint abbreviation.
The classes are named using the format {property}{sides}-{size}
for xs
and {property}{sides}-{breakpoint}-{size}
for sm
,md
,lg
,xl
and xxl
.
Whereproperty is one of:
m
- for classes that setmargin
p
- for classes that setpadding
Wheresides is one of:
t
- for classes that setmargin-top
orpadding-top
b
- for classes that setmargin-bottom
orpadding-bottom
s
- for classes that setmargin-left
orpadding-left
e
- for classes that setmargin-right
orpadding-right
x
- for classes that set both*-left
and*-right
y
- for classes that set both*-top
and*-bottom
- blank - for classes that set a
margin
orpadding
on all 4 sides of the element
Wheresize is one of: 0
,1
,2
,3
,4
,5
,6
,7
,8
,9
,10
,11
& auto
Examples
Here are some representative examples of these classes:
.mt-0 {
margin-top: 0 !important;
}
.ms-1 {
margin-left: ($spacer * .25) !important;
}
.px-2 {
padding-left: ($spacer * .5) !important;
padding-right: ($spacer * .5) !important;
}
.p-3 {
padding: $spacer !important;
}
Horizontal centering
Additionally, Bootstrap also includes an .mx-auto
class for horizontally centering fixed-width block level content—that is, content that has display: block
and a width
set—by setting the horizontal margins to auto
.
<div class="mx-auto bg-body-highlight" style="width: 200px;">Centered element</div>
Negative margins
In CSS, margin
properties can utilize negative values (padding
cannot). These negative margins are disabled by default, but can be enabled in Sass by setting $enable-negative-margins: true
.
The syntax is nearly the same as the default, positive margin utilities, but with the addition of n
before the requested size. Here’s an example class that’s the opposite of .mt-1
:
.mt-n1 {
margin-top: -0.25rem !important;
}
Gap
When using display: grid
, you can make use of gap
utilities on the parent grid container. This can save on having to add margin utilities to individual grid items (children of a display: grid
container). Gap utilities are responsive by default, and are generated via our utilities API, based on the $spacers
Sass map.
<div class="d-grid gap-3">
<div class="p-2 bg-body-highlight border border-translucent">Grid item 1</div>
<div class="p-2 bg-body-highlight border border-translucent">Grid item 2</div>
<div class="p-2 bg-body-highlight border border-translucent">Grid item 3</div>
</div>