initial
The initial
CSS keyword applies the initial (or default) value of a property to an element. It can be applied to any CSS property. This includes the CSS shorthand all
, with which initial
can be used to restore all CSS properties to their initial state.
On inherited properties, the initial value may be unexpected. You should consider using the inherit
, unset
, or revert
keywords instead.
Examples
Using initial to reset color for an element
HTML
<p>
<span>This text is red.</span>
<em>This text is in the initial color (typically black).</em>
<span>This is red again.</span>
</p>
CSS
p {
color: red;
}
em {
color: initial;
}
Result
Specifications
Specification |
---|
CSS Cascading and Inheritance Level 3 # initial |
Browser compatibility
BCD tables only load in the browser
See also
- Use
unset
to set a property to its inherited value if it inherits, or to its initial value if not. - Use
revert
to reset a property to the value established by the user-agent stylesheet (or by user styles, if any exist). - Use
inherit
to make an element's property the same as its parent. - The
all
property lets you reset all properties to their initial, inherited, reverted, or unset state at once.