Fixed page header overlaps in-page anchors

Question

If I have a non-scrolling header in an HTML page, fixed to the top, having a defined height:

Is there a way to use the URL anchor (the #fragment part) to have the browser scroll to a certain point in the page, but still respect the height of the fixed element without the help of JavaScript?

http://example.com/#bar

WRONG (but the common behavior):         CORRECT:
+---------------------------------+      +---------------------------------+
| BAR///////////////////// header |      | //////////////////////// header |
+---------------------------------+      +---------------------------------+
| Here is the rest of the Text    |      | BAR                             |
| ...                             |      |                                 |
| ...                             |      | Here is the rest of the Text    |
| ...                             |      | ...                             |
+---------------------------------+      +---------------------------------+

Answer 1

I had the same problem. I solved it by adding a class to the anchor element with the topbar height as the padding-top value.

<h1><a class="anchor" name="barlink">Bar</a></h1>

I used this CSS:

.anchor { padding-top: 90px; }

Answer 2

If you can’t or don’t want to set a new class, add a fixed-height ::before pseudo-element to the :target pseudo-class in CSS:

:target::before {
  content: "";
  display: block;
  height: 60px; /* fixed header height*/
  margin: -60px 0 0; /* negative fixed header height */
}

Or scroll the page relative to :target with jQuery:

var offset = $(':target').offset();
var scrollto = offset.top - 60; // minus fixed header height
$('html, body').animate({scrollTop:scrollto}, 0);

Answer 3

html {
  scroll-padding-top: 70px; /* height of sticky header */
}

from: https://css-tricks.com/fixed-headers-on-page-links-and-overlapping-content-oh-my/

Answer 4

I use this approach:

/* add class="jumptarget" to all targets. */

.jumptarget::before {
  content:"";
  display:block;
  height:50px; /* fixed header height*/
  margin:-50px 0 0; /* negative fixed header height */
}

It adds an invisible element before each target. It works IE8+.

Here are more solutions: http://nicolasgallagher.com/jump-links-and-viewport-positioning/

Answer 5

Official Bootstrap Adopted Answer:

*[id]:before { 
  display: block; 
  content: " "; 
  margin-top: -75px; // Set the Appropriate Height
  height: 75px; // Set the Appropriate Height
  visibility: hidden; 
}

Credits

Merge

Answer 6

From 4/2021 there is single non-hacky and fully cross-browser solution:

h1 {
  scroll-margin-top: 50px
}

It is part of CSS Scroll Snap spec. Runs on all modern browsers.

Answer 7

The best way that I found to handle this issue is (replace 65px with your fixed element height):

div:target {
  padding-top: 65px; 
  margin-top: -65px;
}

If you do not like to use the target selector you can also do it in this way:

.my-target {
    padding-top: 65px;
    margin-top: -65px;
}

Note: this example will not work if the target element have a backgound color that differant from his parent. for example:

<div style="background-color:red;height:100px;"></div>
<div class="my-target" style="background-color:green;height:100px;"></div>

in this case the green color of my-target element will overwrite his parent red element in 65px. I did not find any pure CSS solution to handle this issue but if you do not have another background color this solution is the best.

Answer 8

While some of the proposed solutions work for fragment links (= hash links) within the same page (like a menu link that scrolls down), I found that none of them worked in current Chrome when you want to use fragment links coming in from other pages.

So calling www.mydomain.com/page.html#foo from scratch will NOT offset your target in current Chrome with any of the given CSS solutions or JS solutions.

There is also a jQuery bug report describing some details of the problem.

SOLUTION

The only option I found so far that really works in Chrome is JavaScript that is not called onDomReady but with a delay.

// set timeout onDomReady
$(function() {
    setTimeout(delayedFragmentTargetOffset, 500);
});

// add scroll offset to fragment target (if there is one)
function delayedFragmentTargetOffset(){
    var offset = $(':target').offset();
    if(offset){
        var scrollto = offset.top - 95; // minus fixed header height
        $('html, body').animate({scrollTop:scrollto}, 0);
    }
}

SUMMARY

Without a JS delay solutions will probably work in Firefox, IE, Safari, but not in Chrome.

Answer 9

You can now use scroll-margin-top, which is pretty widely adopted.

Simply add the following CSS to the element you want to scroll to:

.element {
  scroll-margin-top: 2em;
}

Answer 10

For Chrome/Safari/Firefox you could add a display: block and use a negative margin to compensate the offset, like:

a[name] {
    display: block;
    padding-top: 90px;
    margin-top: -90px;
}

See example http://codepen.io/swed/pen/RrZBJo

Answer 11

Just discovered another pure CSS solution that worked like a charme for me!

html {
  scroll-padding-top: 80px; /* height of your sticky header */
}

Found on this site!

Answer 12

You can do this with jQuery:

var offset = $('.target').offset();
var scrollto = offset.top - 50; // fixed_top_bar_height = 50px
$('html, body').animate({scrollTop:scrollto}, 0);

Answer 13

I've got it working easily with CSS and HTML, using the "anchor:before" method mentioned above. I think it works the best, because it doesn't create massive padding between your divs.

.anchor:before {
  content:"";
  display:block;
  height:60px; /* fixed header height*/
  margin:-60px 0 0; /* negative fixed header height */
}

It doesn't seem to work for the first div on the page, but you can counter that by adding padding to that first div.

#anchor-one{padding-top: 60px;}

Here's a working fiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/FRpHE/24/

Answer 14

You could try this:

<style>
h1:target { padding-top: 50px; }
</style>

<a href="#bar">Go to bar</a>

<h1 id="bar">Bar</h1>

Set the top padding value to the actual height of your header. This will introduce a slight extra gap at the top of your header, but it will only be visible when the user jumps to the anchor and then scrolls up. I've made up that solution for my site right now, but it only shows a small fixed bar at the top of the page, nothing too high.

Answer 15

I wasn't having any luck with the answer listed above and ended up using this solution which worked perfectly...

Create a blank span where you want to set your anchor.

<span class="anchor" id="section1"></span>
<div class="section"></div>

And apply the following class:

.anchor {
  display: block;
  height: 115px;       /* same height as header */
  margin-top: -115px;  /* same height as header */
  visibility: hidden;
}

This solution will work even if the sections have different colored backgrounds! I found the solution at this link.

Answer 16

It works for me:

HTML LINK to Anchor:

<a href="#security">SECURITY</a>

HTML Anchor:

<a name="security" class="anchor"></a>

CSS :

.anchor::before {
    content: "";
    display: block;
    margin-top: -50px;
    position: absolute;
}

Answer 17

I had a lot of trouble with many of the answers here and elsewhere as my bookmarked anchors were section headers in an FAQ page, so offsetting the header didn't help as the rest of the content would just stay where it was. So I thought I'd post.

What I ended up doing was a composite of a few solutions:

1. The CSS:

   .bookmark {
       margin-top:-120px;
       padding-bottom:120px; 
       display:block;
   }
   

Where "120px" is your fixed header height (maybe plus some margin).

2. The bookmark link HTML:

   <a href="#01">What is your FAQ question again?</a>
   

3. The bookmarked content HTML:

   <span class="bookmark" id="01"></span>
   <h3>What is your FAQ question again?</h3>
   <p>Some FAQ text, followed by ...</p>
   <p>... some more FAQ text, etc ...</p>
   

The good thing about this solution is that the span element is not only hidden, it is essentially collapsed and doesn't pad out your content.

I can't take much credit for this solution as it comes from a swag of different resources, but it worked best for me in my situation.

You can see the actual result here.

Answer 18

It feels somewhat hacky to my purist mind but as a css-only solution you can add padding to the active anchored element using the :target selector:

html, body {height:100%; min-height:100%; margin:0;}
body {min-height:200%;}
header {display:inline-block; position:fixed; font-size:1.5em; height:100px; top:0; left:0; right:0; line-height:100px; background:black; text-align:center;}
header a {color:#fff;}
section {padding:30px; margin:20px;}
section:first-of-type, section:target {padding-top:130px;}

<header><a href="#one">#One</a> <a href="#two">#two</a> <a href="#three">#three</a></header>
<section id="one"><h1>One</h1>Aenean lacinia bibendum nulla sed consectetur. Nullam id dolor id nibh ultricies vehicula ut id elit. Integer posuere erat a ante venenatis dapibus posuere velit aliquet.</section>
<section id="two"><h1>Two</h1>Aenean lacinia bibendum nulla sed consectetur. Nullam id dolor id nibh ultricies vehicula ut id elit. Integer posuere erat a ante venenatis dapibus posuere velit aliquet.</section>
<section id="three"><h1>Three</h1>Aenean lacinia bibendum nulla sed consectetur. Nullam id dolor id nibh ultricies vehicula ut id elit. Integer posuere erat a ante venenatis dapibus posuere velit aliquet.</section>

Answer 19

I'm using @Jpsy's answer, but for performance reasons I'm only setting the timer if the hash is present in the URL.

$(function() {
      // Only set the timer if you have a hash
      if(window.location.hash) {
        setTimeout(delayedFragmentTargetOffset, 500);
      }
  });

function delayedFragmentTargetOffset(){
      var offset = $(':target').offset();
      if(offset){
          var scrollto = offset.top - 80; // minus fixed header height
          $('html, body').animate({scrollTop:scrollto}, 0);
          $(':target').highlight();
      }
  };

Answer 20

I found I had to use both MutttenXd's and Badabam's CSS solutions together, as the first did not work in Chrome and the second did not work in Firefox:

a.anchor { 
  padding-top: 90px;
}

a.anchor:before { 
  display: block;
  content: "";
  height: 90px;
  margin-top: -90px;
}

<a class="anchor" name="shipping"></a><h2>Shipping (United States)</h2>
...

Answer 21

The way that I find being the cleanest is the following one :

  #bar::before {
    display: block;
    content: " ";
    margin-top: -150px;
    height: 150px;
    visibility: hidden;
    pointer-events: none;
  }

Answer 22

A minimally intrusive approach using jQuery:

Link:

<a href="#my-anchor-1" class="anchor-link">Go To Anchor 1</a>

Content:

<h3 id="my-anchor-1">Here is Anchor 1</a>

Script:

$(".anchor-link").click(function() {
    var headerHeight = 120;
    $('html, body').stop(true, true).animate({
        scrollTop: $(this.hash).offset().top - headerHeight
    }, 750);
    return false;
});

By assigning the anchor-link class to the links, the behaviour of other links (like accordion or tab controls) are not affected.

The question doesn't want javascript but the other more popular question is closed because of this one and I couldn't answer there.

Answer 23

I needed something that works for inbound links, links on page, AND that can be targeted by JS so the page can respond to changes in the header height

HTML

<ul>
  <li><a href="#ft_who">Who?</a></li>
  <li><a href="#ft_what">What?</a></li>
  <li><a href="#ft_when">When?</a></li>
</ul>
...
<h2 id="ft_who" class="fragment-target">Who?</h2> 
...
<a href="#">Can I be clicked?</a>
<h2 id="ft_what" class="fragment-target">What?</h2>
...
<h2 id="ft_when" class="fragment-target">When?</h2> 

CSS

.fragment-target {
    display: block;
    margin-top: -HEADER_HEIGHTpx;
    padding-top: HEADER_HEIGHTpx;
    z-index: -1;
}

The z-index: -1 allows links in the 'padding area' above a fragment-target to still be clickable, as commented by @MuttenXd on his answer

I haven't found an issue yet in IE 11, Edge 15+, Chrome 38+, FF 52+, or Safari 9.1+

Answer 24

I solve my issue with scroll-margin-top property for the anchor element

scroll-margin-top: 100px;

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/scroll-margin-top

Answer 25

<div style="position:relative; top:-45px;">
    <a name="fragment"> </a>
</div>

This code should do the trick. Swap out 45px for the height of your header bar.

EDIT: If using jQuery is an option, I've also been successful using jQuery.localScroll with an offset value set. The offset option is a part of jQuery.scrollTo, which jQuery.localScroll is built upon. A demo is available here: http://demos.flesler.com/jquery/scrollTo/ (second window, under 'offset')

Answer 26

Here is a complete jquery solution that will work in IE:

Suppose the navigation bar elements are something like this:

<ul>
    <li><a class="navigation" href="/#contact-us">Contact us</a></li>
    <li><a class="navigation" href="/#about-us">About us</a></li>
</ul>

You can use the following jquery snippet to offset the scroll:

$(function() {
    $("a.navigation").click(function(event) {
        event.preventDefault();
        offSetScroll($(this));
    });
    offSetScrollFromLocation(window.location.href.toLowerCase());
});

function offSetScroll(anchor) {
    var href = anchor.attr("href");
    offSetScrollFromLocation(href);
}

function offSetScrollFromLocation(href) {
    //Change this according to the height of the navigation bar
    var fromTop = 250;
    if(href.indexOf("#")<=0)
        return;
    var hash=href.substring(href.indexOf("#"));
    var targetOffset = $(hash).offset().top-fromTop;
    $('html, body').animate({scrollTop: targetOffset}, 400, function(e) {

    });
}

Answer 27

Implemented using :before worked great until we realized that the pseudo element was actually covering and blocking pointer events that sat within the pseudo element's area. Using something like pointer-events: none on the :before or even directly on the anchor had no affect.

What we ended up doing was making the anchor's positioning absolute and then adjusting it's position to be the offset/height of the fixed area.

Offset Anchor without Blocking Pointer Events

.section-marker {

    position: absolute;
    top: -300px;
}

The value with this is that we're not blocking any elements that might fall within those 300px. The downside is that grabbing that element's position from Javascript needs to take into account that offset so any logic there had to be adjusted.

Answer 28

This is how I got it to finally go to the proper place when you click on the navigation. I added an event handler for the navigation clicks. Then you can just use "scrollBy" to move up on the offset.

var offset = 90;

 $('.navbar li a').click(function(event) {
    event.preventDefault();
    $($(this).attr('href'))[0].scrollIntoView();
    scrollBy(0, -offset);
 });

Answer 29

I created a div with a few line breaks and gave that the id, I then put the code I wanted to show underneath. The link would then take you to the space above the image and the header would no longer be in the way:

<a href="#image">Image</a>
<div id="image"><br><br></div>
<img src="Image.png">

Of course, you can change the number of line breaks to suit your needs. This worked perfectly for me, not sure if there are any problems though, I am still learning HTML.

Answer 30

Used this script

$(document).on('click', 'a[href^="#"]', function (event) {
    event.preventDefault();

    $('html, body').animate({
        scrollTop: $($.attr(this, 'href')).offset().top -140
    }, 1000);
});