Set div to remaining height using CSS with unknown height divs above and below
2014 UPDATE: The modern way to solve this layout problem is to use the flexbox CSS model. It's supported by all major browsers and IE11+.
2012: The correct way to do this with CSS alone is to use display: table and display: table-row. These are supported by all major browsers, starting with IE8. This is not using tables for display. You'll use divs:
html, body {
height: 100%;
margin: 0;
}
.wrapper {
display: table;
height: 100%;
width: 100%;
background: yellow; /* just to make sure nothing bleeds */
}
.header {
display: table-row;
background: gray;
}
.content {
display: table-row; /* height is dynamic, and will expand... */
height: 100%; /* ...as content is added (won't scroll) */
background: turquoise;
}
.footer {
display: table-row;
background: lightgray;
}<div class="wrapper">
<div class="header">
<h1>Header</h1>
<p>Header of variable height</p>
</div>
<div class="content">
<h2>Content that expands in height dynamically to adjust for new content</h2>
Content height will initially be the remaining
height in its container (<code>.wrapper</code>).
<!-- p style="font-size: 4000%">Tall content</p -->
</div>
<div class="footer">
<h3>Sticky footer</h3>
<p>Footer of variable height</p>
</div>
</div>That's it. The divs are wrapped as you'd expect.
A cross-browser solution derived from Dan Dascalescu answer:
http://jsfiddle.net/Uc9E2
html, body {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
height: 100%;
}
.l-fit-height {
display: table;
height: 100%;
}
.l-fit-height-row {
display: table-row;
height: 1px;
}
.l-fit-height-row-content {
/* Firefox requires this */
display: table-cell;
}
.l-fit-height-row-expanded {
height: 100%;
display: table-row;
}
.l-fit-height-row-expanded > .l-fit-height-row-content {
height: 100%;
width: 100%;
}
@-moz-document url-prefix() {
.l-scroll {
/* Firefox requires this to do the absolute positioning correctly */
display: inline-block;
}
}
.l-scroll {
overflow-y: auto;
position: relative;
height: 1000px;
}
.l-scroll-content {
position: absolute;
top: 0;
bottom: 0;
height: 1000px;
min-height:100px;
}<div class="l-fit-height">
<section class="l-fit-height-row">
<div class="l-fit-height-row-content">
<p>Header</p>
</div>
</section>
<section class="l-fit-height-row-expanded">
<div class="l-fit-height-row-content l-scroll">
<div class="l-scroll-content">
<p>Foo</p>
</div>
</div>
</section>
<section class="l-fit-height-row">
<div class="l-fit-height-row-content">
<p>Footer</p>
</div>
</section>
</div>