Dynamic

Percentage Units vs Em Units

Developers should learn and use percentage units when building responsive web designs that need to adjust fluidly across devices, such as in grid layouts, image sizing, or typography scaling meets developers should use em units when creating responsive designs that need to scale with user font-size preferences, such as in typography, margins, and padding for text-heavy interfaces. Here's our take.

🧊Nice Pick

Percentage Units

Developers should learn and use percentage units when building responsive web designs that need to adjust fluidly across devices, such as in grid layouts, image sizing, or typography scaling

Percentage Units

Nice Pick

Developers should learn and use percentage units when building responsive web designs that need to adjust fluidly across devices, such as in grid layouts, image sizing, or typography scaling

Pros

  • +They are essential for creating flexible components that maintain proportions relative to their containers, improving accessibility and user experience on varying viewports
  • +Related to: css-units, responsive-design

Cons

  • -Specific tradeoffs depend on your use case

Em Units

Developers should use em units when creating responsive designs that need to scale with user font-size preferences, such as in typography, margins, and padding for text-heavy interfaces

Pros

  • +They are particularly useful for building accessible websites that respect browser zoom settings and user-defined font sizes, ensuring elements remain proportional and readable across different devices and user configurations
  • +Related to: css, responsive-web-design

Cons

  • -Specific tradeoffs depend on your use case

The Verdict

Use Percentage Units if: You want they are essential for creating flexible components that maintain proportions relative to their containers, improving accessibility and user experience on varying viewports and can live with specific tradeoffs depend on your use case.

Use Em Units if: You prioritize they are particularly useful for building accessible websites that respect browser zoom settings and user-defined font sizes, ensuring elements remain proportional and readable across different devices and user configurations over what Percentage Units offers.

🧊
The Bottom Line
Percentage Units wins

Developers should learn and use percentage units when building responsive web designs that need to adjust fluidly across devices, such as in grid layouts, image sizing, or typography scaling

Disagree with our pick? nice@nicepick.dev