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<h1 id="styling-empty-table-cells">Styling Empty Table Cells</h1>
<p>2019-07-17</p>
<p>Often when designing tables on the web you&#8217;re bound to come across empty pockets of data. These will be rendered as &#8220;blank&#8221; table cells, which isn&#8217;t always the intended outcome. Let&#8217;s take a quick look at how to target and style empty table cells.</p>
<h2 id="the-easy-way">The easy <code>:empty</code> way</h2>
<p>The most popular way to target <em>any</em> empty element is by using - you guessed it - the <code>empty</code> pseudo-class. This pseudo-class is incredibly simple. You target an element&#8217;s <code>empty</code> state that same way you would target <code>hover</code> or <code>active</code>:</p>
<pre><code>table tr td:empty {
    opacity: 0;
}
</code></pre>
<p>Check out the CodePen examples below for more advanced styling options:</p>
<p><a href="https://codepen.io/bradleytaunt/pen/EBBLEx/">Live CodePen Example 1</a></p>
<p>You can also include additional pseudo elements to give the user more context about what the empty cells represent:</p>
<p><a href="https://codepen.io/bradleytaunt/pen/bPXqLa/">Live CodePen Example 2</a></p>
<h2 id="more-specific-property">More specific <code>empty-cells</code> property</h2>
<p>Although using the <code>:empty</code> pseudo-class can be helpful, it isn&#8217;t used just for tables. It can be used for any HTML elements that have a lack of content. So, is there a CSS specific property that can target <em>just</em> table cells? </p>
<p>Let&#8217;s take a look at the <code>empty-cells</code> property:</p>
<pre><code>table {
    empty-cells: hide;
}
</code></pre>
<p><a href="https://codepen.io/bradleytaunt/pen/XLLqOW/">Live CodePen Example 3</a></p>
<p>Pros of using <code>empty-cells</code>:</p>
<ul>
<li>Only one CSS property</li>
<li>Targets the table elements specifically</li>
<li>No need for custom styles since it simply <em>hides</em> empty cell borders</li>
</ul>
<p>Some downsides to using this property:</p>
<ul>
<li>No styling customization</li>
<li>Trickier to use pseudo-element helpers without invoking the <code>:empty</code> state</li>
</ul>
<h2 id="pick-your-preference">Pick your preference</h2>
<p>It doesn&#8217;t matter semantically which option you decide to take when styling &#47; hiding empty table cells. Using the <code>:empty</code> state gives you a lot more flexibility in terms of what you can target (full rows, columns etc), but using the <code>empty-cells</code> property let&#8217;s you simply hide the cells and focus on more important items.</p>
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