Is there a way to break a list into columns?

Question

My webpage has a 'skinny' list: for example, a list of 100 items of one word in length each. To reduce scrolling, I want to present this list in two or even four columns on the page. How should I do this with CSS?

I prefer the solution to be flexible so that if the list grows to 200 items, I don't have to do a lot of manual adjustments to accommodate the new list.

Answer 1

The CSS solution is: http://www.w3.org/TR/css3-multicol/

The browser support is exactly what you'd expect..

It works "everywhere" except Internet Explorer 9 or older: http://caniuse.com/multicolumn

ul {
    -moz-column-count: 4;
    -moz-column-gap: 20px;
    -webkit-column-count: 4;
    -webkit-column-gap: 20px;
    column-count: 4;
    column-gap: 20px;
}

See: http://jsfiddle.net/pdExf/

If IE support is required, you'll have to use JavaScript, for example:

http://welcome.totheinter.net/columnizer-jquery-plugin/

Another solution is to fallback to normal float: left for only IE. The order will be wrong, but at least it will look similar:

See: http://jsfiddle.net/NJ4Hw/

<!--[if lt IE 10]>
<style>
li {
    width: 25%;
    float: left
}
</style>
<![endif]-->

You could apply that fallback with Modernizr if you're already using it.