Question

I have seen people set an element’s style to:

element{
    position:absolute;
    left:-10000px;
}

rather than setting:

element{
    display:none;
}

Does the first method have better browser support, or why do they do it that way?

Answer 1

An element whose display style property is none cannot be measured. Properties like offsetWidth and offsetHeight will always return 0 in that case.

On the other hand, an element that’s visible but displaced outside the document area can be measured. So, if you want to hide an element but still be able to determine its width and height, the first solution is the way to go.