Make flex container take width of content, not width 100%

Question

In the below example, I have a button with the following styles...

.button-flexbox-approach {
    /* other button styles */
    display: flex;
    justify-content: center;
    align-items: center;
    padding: 1.5rem 2rem;
}

http://codepen.io/3stacks/pen/JWErZJ

But it automatically scales to 100% instead of the width of the content. You can set an explicit width, but then that doesn't allow your text to wrap naturally.

How can I make a button that has the inner text centered with flexbox, but doesn't grow to fit the size of the container?

Answer 1

Instead of display: flex on the container, use display: inline-flex.

This switches the container from block-level (which takes the full width of its parent) to inline-level (which takes the width of its content).

This sizing behavior is similar to display: block vs. display: inline-block.

For a related problem and solution see:

• Make flex items take content width, not width of parent container