writing somewhat of a css hack, styling for :hover {} works interestingly, but browsers

Question

Asked: May 20, 20262026-05-20T14:38:49+00:00 2026-05-20T14:38:49+00:00

writing somewhat of a css hack, styling for :hover {} works interestingly, but browsers treat a:hover differently for full links VS hash tags.

a, a:active, a:visited { color: #765; text-decoration: none;} :hover { color: #ff5e99; text-decoration:overline; background: #222}

for this code, hovers on <a href='http://what.eva/'></a> and <a href='#whateva'></a> behave differently. They also differ for webkit and gecko.

Can someone explain what is happening?

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EDITED FOR EXPLANATION ON SOLUTION

the answer by @babtek pointed me in the right direction, and the solution was to expand the css rule to :hover, :visited:hover {...}

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Editorial Team · Answer 1 · 2026-05-20T14:38:49+00:00

Editorial Team

I think a:visited ends up being more specific than :hover since it has a tagname as well… your “#” links might not get flagged as visited?

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