In order for CSS to inform the style of the content on the page, it must be integrated with your HTML. CSS can be integrated into your HTML in three ways: inline, internal, and external.
Inline styling adds CSS directly into the HTML of a page to adjust the style of particular parts of a page.
For example, if you want the text of your first paragraph to be red, but the text of your second paragraph to be blue:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<title>About</title>
</head>
<body>
<p style="color: red">
Content of paragraph
</p>
<p style="color: blue">
Content of paragraph
</p>
</body>
</html>
Internal styling also adds CSS directly into the HTML, but keeps it separate from the content code of the page by adding it into the head using the <style>
tag. When using internal styling you are providing styling rules for the entire page. For example, if you want all headings to be blue:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<title>About</title>
<style>
h1 {
color: blue;
}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1>
Heading One
</h1>
<p>
Content of paragraph
</p>
<h1>
Heading Two
</h1>
<p>
Content of paragraph
</p>
</body>
</html>
External styling creates a completely separate document for your CSS that will be linked to your HTML in the head section of your HTML document using the code below. This separate document is called a stylesheet and should be named stlye.css
. This document must be stored in the same folder as the HTML document it is linked to.
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<title>CSS Example</title>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css">
</head>
<body>
</body>
</html>
Option 3, external styling, is preferred by most web developers because it's more manageable and because it lends itself to greater consistency across the entire site.
Create a stylesheet using the command line. In your index.html
document, link to your style sheet and re-save the file.
If you need a reminder on which commands to use to create your new stylesheet file, see here.
To link your stylesheet with your index.html
file, insert the following code into the head element:
<link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css">