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css property

`text-orientation` CSS property

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The text-orientation CSS property sets the orientation of the text characters in a line. It only affects text in vertical mode (when writing-mode is not horizontal-tb). It is useful for controlling the display of languages that use vertical script, and also for making vertical table headers.

Interactive exampleOpen the canonical MDN source to run this embedded demo.
writing-mode: vertical-rl;
text-orientation: mixed;

writing-mode: vertical-rl;
text-orientation: upright;

<section class="default-example" id="default-example">
  <div class="transition-all" id="example-element">
    <p>
      In another moment down went Alice after it, never once considering how in
      the world she was to get out again.
    </p>
  </div>
</section>

Syntax

/* Keyword values */
text-orientation: mixed;
text-orientation: upright;
text-orientation: sideways-right;
text-orientation: sideways;
text-orientation: use-glyph-orientation;

/* Global values */
text-orientation: inherit;
text-orientation: initial;
text-orientation: revert;
text-orientation: revert-layer;
text-orientation: unset;

Values

This property is specified as one of the following keyword values:

  • mixed
    • : Rotates the characters of horizontal scripts 90° clockwise. Lays out the characters of vertical scripts naturally. Default value.
  • upright
    • : Lays out the characters of horizontal scripts naturally (upright), as well as the glyphs for vertical scripts. Note that this keyword causes all characters to be considered as left-to-right: the used value of direction is forced to be ltr.
  • sideways
    • : Causes characters to be laid out as they would be horizontally, but with the whole line rotated 90° clockwise.
  • sideways-right
    • : An alias to sideways that is kept for compatibility purposes.
  • use-glyph-orientation
    • : On SVG elements, this keyword leads to use the value of the deprecated SVG properties glyph-orientation-vertical and glyph-orientation-horizontal.

Formal definition

Formal syntax

Examples

HTML

<p>Lorem ipsum dolet semper quisquam.</p>

CSS

p {
  writing-mode: vertical-rl;
  text-orientation: upright;
}

Result

Interactive exampleOpen the canonical MDN source to run this embedded demo.

Specifications

SpecificationsStandards references are available on the canonical MDN page.

Browser compatibility

Browser compatibilityCompatibility data is available on the canonical MDN page.

See also