Pure CSS Breadcrumb Navigation

This pure CSS code snippet helps you to create a simple breadcrumb navigation. It uses CSS before and after pseudo selectors to design arrow separators between the navigational links. The design of the breadcrumb comes with two light and dark variants.

How to Create Pure CSS Breadcrumb Navigation

First of all, load the following assets into the head tag of your HTML document.

<script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/modernizr/2.8.3/modernizr.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

Create the HTML structure as follows:

<!-- a simple div with some links -->
<div class="breadcrumb">
	<a href="#" class="active">Browse</a>
	<a href="#">Compare</a>
	<a href="#">Order Confirmation</a>
	<a href="#">Checkout</a>
</div>
<br /><br />
<!-- another version - flat style with animated hover effect -->
<div class="breadcrumb flat">
	<a href="#" class="active">Browse</a>
	<a href="#">Compare</a>
	<a href="#">Order Confirmation</a>
	<a href="#">Checkout</a>
</div>

<!-- Prefixfree -->
<script src="http://thecodeplayer.com/uploads/js/prefixfree-1.0.7.js" type="text/javascript" type="text/javascript"></script>

Style using the following CSS styles:

/*custom font*/
@import url(https://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Merriweather+Sans);

* {margin: 0; padding: 0;}

html, body {min-height: 100%;}

body {
	text-align: center;
	padding-top: 100px;
	background: #689976;
	background: linear-gradient(#689976, #ACDACC);
	font-family: 'Merriweather Sans', arial, verdana;
}

.breadcrumb {
	/*centering*/
	display: inline-block;
	box-shadow: 0 0 15px 1px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.35);
	overflow: hidden;
	border-radius: 5px;
	/*Lets add the numbers for each link using CSS counters. flag is the name of the counter. to be defined using counter-reset in the parent element of the links*/
	counter-reset: flag; 
}

.breadcrumb a {
	text-decoration: none;
	outline: none;
	display: block;
	float: left;
	font-size: 12px;
	line-height: 36px;
	color: white;
	/*need more margin on the left of links to accomodate the numbers*/
	padding: 0 10px 0 60px;
	background: #666;
	background: linear-gradient(#666, #333);
	position: relative;
}
/*since the first link does not have a triangle before it we can reduce the left padding to make it look consistent with other links*/
.breadcrumb a:first-child {
	padding-left: 46px;
	border-radius: 5px 0 0 5px; /*to match with the parent's radius*/
}
.breadcrumb a:first-child:before {
	left: 14px;
}
.breadcrumb a:last-child {
	border-radius: 0 5px 5px 0; /*this was to prevent glitches on hover*/
	padding-right: 20px;
}

/*hover/active styles*/
.breadcrumb a.active, .breadcrumb a:hover{
	background: #333;
	background: linear-gradient(#333, #000);
}
.breadcrumb a.active:after, .breadcrumb a:hover:after {
	background: #333;
	background: linear-gradient(135deg, #333, #000);
}

/*adding the arrows for the breadcrumbs using rotated pseudo elements*/
.breadcrumb a:after {
	content: '';
	position: absolute;
	top: 0; 
	right: -18px; /*half of square's length*/
	/*same dimension as the line-height of .breadcrumb a */
	width: 36px; 
	height: 36px;
	/*as you see the rotated square takes a larger height. which makes it tough to position it properly. So we are going to scale it down so that the diagonals become equal to the line-height of the link. We scale it to 70.7% because if square's: 
	length = 1; diagonal = (1^2 + 1^2)^0.5 = 1.414 (pythagoras theorem)
	if diagonal required = 1; length = 1/1.414 = 0.707*/
	transform: scale(0.707) rotate(45deg);
	/*we need to prevent the arrows from getting buried under the next link*/
	z-index: 1;
	/*background same as links but the gradient will be rotated to compensate with the transform applied*/
	background: #666;
	background: linear-gradient(135deg, #666, #333);
	/*stylish arrow design using box shadow*/
	box-shadow: 
		2px -2px 0 2px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.4), 
		3px -3px 0 2px rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.1);
	/*
		5px - for rounded arrows and 
		50px - to prevent hover glitches on the border created using shadows*/
	border-radius: 0 5px 0 50px;
}
/*we dont need an arrow after the last link*/
.breadcrumb a:last-child:after {
	content: none;
}
/*we will use the :before element to show numbers*/
.breadcrumb a:before {
	content: counter(flag);
	counter-increment: flag;
	/*some styles now*/
	border-radius: 100%;
	width: 20px;
	height: 20px;
	line-height: 20px;
	margin: 8px 0;
	position: absolute;
	top: 0;
	left: 30px;
	background: #444;
	background: linear-gradient(#444, #222);
	font-weight: bold;
}


.flat a, .flat a:after {
	background: white;
	color: black;
	transition: all 0.5s;
}
.flat a:before {
	background: white;
	box-shadow: 0 0 0 1px #ccc;
}
.flat a:hover, .flat a.active, 
.flat a:hover:after, .flat a.active:after{
	background: #9EEB62;
}

That’s all! hopefully, you have successfully created Pure Css Breadcrumb Navigation. If you have any questions or suggestions, feel free to comment below.