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CSS <length> Data Type

The CSS <length> data type denotes distance measurements using relative or absolute units.

The <length> data type is a dimension, so it consists of a valid number immediately followed by a unit identifier (with no space between the number and the unit identifier).

When you see <length> (including the < and >) anywhere in the CSS specifications, this refers to the fact that the value can be any valid length.

For example, the font-size property accepts the following value types:

Which means that <length> is one of the accepted types.

So you could do something like this:

Which will result in this:

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Accepted Units

The <length> type can use any of the following units.

Relative Lengths

Relative length units specify a length relative to another length.

em
Relative to the font size of the element. An em is equal to the computed value of the font-size property of the element on which it is used.
ex
Relative to the used x-height of the first available font.
ch
Relative to the width of the "0" (ZERO, U+0030) glyph in the element's font.
rem
Relative to the font size of the root element (usually the HTML element).
vw
Relative to 1% of the viewport's width.
vh
Relative to 1% of the viewport's height.
vmin
Relative to 1% of the viewport's smaller dimension (i.e. equal to the smaller of vw or vh).
vmax
Relative to 1% of the viewport's larger dimension (i.e. equal to the larger of vw or vh).

Absolute Lengths

cm
Centimeters. 1cm is the equivalent of 96px/2.54.
mm
Millimeters. 1mm is the equivalent of 1/10th of 1cm
Q
Quarter-millimeters. 1q is the equivalent of 1/40th of 1cm.
in
Inches. 1in = 2.54cm is the equivalent of 96px.
pc
Picas. 1pc is the equivalent of 1/6th of 1in.
pt
Points. 1pt is the equivalent of 1/72th of 1in.
px
Pixels. 1px is the equivalent of 1/96th of 1in.

So the following are all examples of valid <length> values:

CSS Specifications