CSS Font Stretch

CSS font-stretch property is used to widen or narrow the text on a webpage. For example,

body {
    font-family: Arial, sans-serif;
}

p.normal {
    font-stretch: normal;
}

p.condensed {
    font-stretch: condensed;
}

Browser Output

CSS Font Stretch Example 1 Description

Here, font-stretch: condensed narrows the width of characters.


css-font-stretch-syntax CSS Font Stretch Syntax

The font-stretch property has the following syntax,

font-stretch: normal | semi-condensed | condensed | extra-condensed | ultra-condensed | semi-expanded | expanded | extra-expanded | ultra-expanded  

The possible value for CSS font-stretch are shown in the following table:

Font Style Values Description
normal default value for font-style, the font appears in normal width
semi-condensed font appears slightly narrower than normal
condensed font appears narrower than semi-condensed
extra-condensed font appears narrower than condensed
ultra-condensed font appears narrower than extra-condensed
semi-expanded font appears wider than normal
expanded font appears wider than semi-expanded
extra-expanded font appears wider than expanded
ultra-expanded font appears wider than extra-expanded
percentage value between 50% and 200% (inclusive)
Negative values are not allowed.

Example of font-stretch

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
    <head>
        <meta charset="UTF-8" />
        <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0" />
        <link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css" />
        <title>Using font-stretch</title>
    </head>
    <body>
        <p class="ultra-condensed">Ultra-condensed text</p>
        <p class="extra-condensed">Extra-condensed text</p>
        <p class="condensed">Condensed text</p>
        <p class="semi-condensed">Semi-condensed text</p>
        <p class="normal">Normal text</p>
        <p class="semi-expanded">Semi-expanded text</p>
        <p class="expanded">Expanded text</p>
        <p class="extra-expanded">Extra-expanded text</p>
        <p class="ultra-expanded">Ultra-expanded text</p>
    </body>
</html>
body {
    font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
}

/* sets font-stretch to Ultra-condensed*/
p.ultra-condensed {
    font-stretch: ultra-condensed;
}

/* sets font-stretch to Extra-condensed*/
p.extra-condensed {
    font-stretch: extra-condensed;
}

/* sets font-stretch to Condensed */
p.condensed {
    font-stretch: condensed;
}

/* sets font-stretch to Semi-condensed  */
p.semi-condensed {
    font-stretch: semi-condensed;
}

/* sets font-stretch to Normal  */
p.normal {
    font-stretch: normal;
}

/* sets font-stretch to Semi-expanded */
p.semi-expanded {
    font-stretch: semi-expanded;
}

/* sets font-stretch to Expanded */
p.expanded {
    font-stretch: expanded;
}

/*sets font-stretch to Extra-expanded  */
p.extra-expanded {
    font-stretch: extra-expanded;
}

/* sets font-stretch to Ultra-expanded  */
p.ultra-expanded {
    font-stretch: ultra-expanded;
}

Browser Output

CSS Font Stretch Example 2 Description

In the above example, the output shows the text with different widths based on the different font-stretch values.

Note: The font-stretch property will have no effect if the current font doesn't support the condensed and expanded faces.