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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-26T07:42:15+00:00

I have a nested CSS menu that I can’t get the submenus to come

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I have a nested CSS menu that I can’t get the submenus to come up.

I took the code from A list apart. The example on that site works perfectly fine, but since I have 2 CSS navigational menus on my page, I have to put my HTML elements in different CSS classes.

Here is my code:

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN" 

"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd">
<html>
<head>
  <style type="text/css">
    ul#lvl1 {
        margin:0;
        padding:0;
        list-style:none;
        width:150px; /* Width of Menu Items */
        border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;
    }
    li.lvl1 {position:relative}
    ul.lvl2 {
        position: absolute;
        left: 149px; /* Set 1px less than menu width */
        top: 0;
        display: none;
    }
    /* Styles for Menu Items */
    li.lvl1 > a {
      display: block;
        text-decoration: none;
        color: #777;
        background: #fff; /* IE6 Bug */
        padding: 5px;
        border: 1px solid #ccc;
        border-bottom: 0;
    }
    /* Fix IE. Hide from IE Mac \*/
    *  html.lvl1 > ul > li {float:left;height:1%}
    *  html.lvl1 > ul > li > a {height:1%}
    /* End */
    li.lvl2 > a:hover { color: #E2144A; background: #f9f9f9; } /* Hover Styles */
    li.lvl2 > a { padding: 2px 5px; } /* Sub Menu Styles */
    a.lvl1:hover ul.lvl2 {display: block} /* The magic */
  </style>
</head>
<body>
  <ul id="lvl1">
    <li class="lvl1">
      <a class="lvl1" href="#">item1</a>
      <ul class="lvl2">
        <li class="lvl2">
          <a class="lvl2" href="#">subitem1</a>
        </li>
      </ul>
    </li>
    <li class="lvl1">
      <a class="lvl1" href="#">item2</a>
      <ul class="lvl2">
        <li class="lvl2">
          <a class="lvl2" href="#">subitem2</a>
        </li>
      </ul>
    </li>
  </ul>
</body>
</html>

Now when I hover over the “a” on level 1, the “ul” on level 2 won’t come up. Can someone please shed some light? I may be missing something obvious. Thanks!

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    You must change your CSS selector to target the lvl2 <ul>, since it is not nested anymore (it’s a sibling, so use +).

    a.lvl1:hover + ul.lvl2 {display: block} /* The magic */

    You should read this
    list of css selectors.

    Or you could move the hover on the lvl1 <li>, instead of the anchor

    li.lvl1:hover ul.lvl2 {display: block} /* The magic */
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