CSS Reference

Quick Reference

The background-image property sets one or more background images (with varying placement) for an element. The default placement is at the top-left corner. As a backup, in case the image cannot be loaded, you should also set a background-color.

/* setting one background */
div {
    background-image: url("my-background.jpg");
    background-color: red;
}
/* setting two backgrounds - the second will sit on top of the first */
div {
    background-image: url("my-top-background.jpg"), url("my-bottom-background.jpg");
    background-color: red;
}

Default

Default valuenone
Inherited valuesno
Can it be animated?no

These are the allowed values.

ValueDescription
url('URL')The URL to the image; to specify more than one image, separate the URLs with a comma
noneNo background image will be displayed (default)
conic-gradient()Sets a conic gradient as the background image; define at least two colors
linear-gradient()Sets a linear gradient as the background image; define at least two colors top to bottom
radial-gradient()Sets a radial gradient as the background image; define at least two colors center to edges
repeating-conic-gradient()Repeats a conic gradient
repeating-linear-gradient()Repeats a linear gradient
repeating-radial-gradient()Repeats a radial gradient
initialSets this property to its default value
inheritInherits this property from its parent element

Using JavaScript

The HTML element can also be styled using JavaScript and the element’s id.

document.getElementById('my_div').style.backgroundImage = 'url(my-background.jpg)';
<button onclick='my_function()'>Click Here</button>

<script>
function my_function() {
    document.getElementById('my_div').style.backgroundImage = 'url(my-background.jpg)';
}
</script>

CSS Notes:


We’d like to acknowledge that we learned a great deal of our coding from W3Schools and TutorialsPoint, borrowing heavily from their teaching process and excellent code examples. We highly recommend both sites to deepen your experience, and further your coding journey. We’re just hitting the basics here at 1SMARTchicken.