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CSS3 text | CSS3 text decoration | CSS3 fonts

Here are the tests for the Text and Text Decoration modules.

This is the mobile table. See also the desktop table.

Last major update on 24 February 2013.

Fonts

Here are a few common font declarations. Eventually I’m going to do full font tests, at which time they’ll be moved to the Fonts compatibility table.

Selector iOS Android Opera BlackBerry Nokia Dolphin One Tizen NetFront UC IE9 Firefox
5 6 2 3 4 Chr Mini Mobile 6 7 PB 10 S40 Anna Xpress MeeGo
Italic Yes Yes Almost Yes Messy Yes Yes Incomplete Buggy No Yes Yes Incomplete Yes Yes
Incomplete
The browser does not make the <code> tag in the test cases italic.
  • The HTC Android 4 is Incomplete; the Samsung Android 4 does everything right.
  • Opera Mini is a complete mess. On BlackBerry and Symbian italic is not supported at all, while on iOS the <code> tags are bold, and not italic.
  • S40 and Symbian Anna also make the italic text bold.
Small-caps Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes No Yes Yes
 
Bold, in several flavours Basic Basic Basic Basic Basic Basic Basic Yes
Basic
Browser only supports normal and bold, even though it has a font with more than two weights installed.

Decoration

Selector iOS Android Opera BlackBerry Nokia Dolphin One Tizen NetFront UC IE9 Firefox
5 6 2 3 4 Chr Mini Mobile 6 7 PB 10 S40 Anna Xpress MeeGo
Yes Incomplete Yes Buggy Yes Incomplete Yes Incomplete Yes Yes Incomplete Minimal Yes
Incomplete
The decoration does not apply to the <code> tag in the example. Only line-through goes through the <code> tag.
  • Opera Mini makes the text invisible when you use text-decoration: blink, except on Symbian.
  • S40, Opera and Firefox support blink.
  • UC does not support underline.
Prefixed No No No No No No No Yes
 
Create a text-shadow. Yes Yes Incomplete Yes Incomplete Yes No Yes No Yes Yes No Yes
  • Opera Mini doesn’t apply the blur.
  • BB6 doesn’t apply the blur. BB7 doesn’t apply the color.
yes yes yes yes yes No yes yes yes

No browser supports full-width.

Alignment and justification

Selector iOS Android Opera BlackBerry Nokia Dolphin One Tizen NetFront UC IE9 Firefox
5 6 2 3 4 Chr Mini Mobile 6 7 PB 10 S40 Anna Xpress MeeGo
To align the text left, center, or right Yes Yes Incomplete Yes More incomplete Yes Yes Incomplete Yes
Incomplete
Browser does not support start and end.
More incomplete
In addition, browser does not support justify.

No browser supports start end.

To align the last line of text. Prefixed No No No No No No No Yes
 

Spacing

Selector iOS Android Opera BlackBerry Nokia Dolphin One Tizen NetFront UC IE9 Firefox
5 6 2 3 4 Chr Mini Mobile 6 7 PB 10 S40 Anna Xpress MeeGo
Yes Yes No Yes Yes No Yes No Yes Yes Yes
 
To set the size of the tabs No No -o- No Yes No Untestable No Yes No Yes No Buggy No -moz-
  • Xpress doesn’t support white-space: pre so it never shows tabs.
  • UC gives the tabs in the tab-size: 4 example a larger size than the 8 or 16, which are the same as the default.
Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

The each-line and hanging keywords are not supported.

To remove text wrapping or to make an element behave like a pre Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Buggy Yes Yes Yes
  • Xpress treats pre and pre-wrap as pre-line.
Yes Yes Yes Yes Buggy Yes Yes Yes

No browser supports percentages.

  • S40 and Xpress do not actually apply the spacing, although they wrap the lines as if the words are spaced. Also, I think negative values are ignored by S40.
  • Symbian Anna only picks up the correct spacing after the last comma in the test text.

Hyphenation and breaking

Selector iOS Android Opera BlackBerry Nokia Dolphin One Tizen NetFront UC IE9 Firefox
5 6 2 3 4 Chr Mini Mobile 6 7 PB 10 S40 Anna Xpress MeeGo
To hyphenate a text Prefixed Yes No Incorrect Incomplete No Incomplete No Incomplete No Incomplete Incomplete Yes
Incomplete
Browser supports none but not auto.
  • The Android 3 tablet supports hyphens: auto but ignores my lang="nl" and hyphenates according to the English dictionary (I presume). I assume the reason the tablet has hyphenation and the Android 4 phones don’t is because the tablet has a dictionary and the phones don’t.
  • Opera Mini on iOS and BlackBerry do not even show the actual hyphen. Android and Symbian do.
  • MeeGo doesn’t even support <wbr>, so even hyphens: manual is not supported.
No No No No No Yes No No
 
Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
 

Not supported

The following declarations are supported on some desktop browsers, but on no mobile browser:

Opera Mini note

Opera Mini on iOS and Android support so-called extended font support, which means they can show italic, bold, etc. fonts. Opera Mini on other platforms (basically the old J2ME ones) do not support this. That’s the reason there are differences in text and font support between Opera Minis. It does not depend on the version number, but on the platform.

Tested browsers

Mobile browser test array 1.0.1; February 2013

All these browsers are WebKit-based, with the exception of both Operas (still Presto), IE9 (Trident), and Firefox and Nokia Xpress (Gecko).

Opera Mini and Nokia Xpress are proxy browsers.

iOS 5
Default browser on iPad 2 with iOS 5.1.1 (WebKit 534)
iOS 6
Default browser on iPhone 4S with iOS 6.1.1 (WebKit 536)
Android 2
Default browser on HTC Legend, Android 2.2 (WebKit 533)
Default browser on LG Optimus something, Android 2.2 (WebKit 533)
Default browser on Sony Xperia S, Android 2.3.7 (WebKit 533)
Android 3
Default browser on Packard Bell tablet, Android 3.2.1 (WebKit 534)
Android 4
Default browser on HTC One X, Android 4.1.1 (WebKit 534)
Default browser on Samsung Galaxy Note I, Android 4.0.3 (WebKit 534)
Chrome
Chrome 18 on Nexus 7, Android 4.2.1 (WebKit 535)
Opera Mini
7.5 on Samsung Galaxy Note I, Android 4.0.3
7.1 on BlackBerry 9800 (OS6)
7.1 on Nokia E71 (SymbianOS/9.2)
7.0.5 on iPad 2, iOS 5.1.1
Opera Mobile
12.10 on HTC One X, Android 4.1.1
12.00 on Nokia E7 (Symbian Anna)
BlackBerry 6
Default browser on BB Torch 9800 (OS6) (WebKit 534)
BlackBerry 7
Default browser on BB Torch 9810 (OS7) (WebKit 534)
BlackBerry PB
Default browser on PlayBook with OS 2.1.0 (WebKit 536)
BlackBerry 10
Default browser on Dev Alpha A device with OS 10.0.9 (WebKit 537)
S40
Default browser on Nokia X3-02, S40 (WebKit 420)
Anna
Default browser on Nokia E7 Symbian Anna (WebKit 533)
Xpress
This is Nokia’s Gecko-based proxy browser. I’m testing Xpress 1.0.12 on the Lumia 800 (Windows Phone 7), but it seems this is also the browser users of modern S40s such as the Asha range get. This browser used to be called Ovi.
MeeGo
Default browser on Nokia N950, MeeGo Harmattan 1.2 (WebKit 534)
Dolphin
Independent full browser for Android.
Dolphin Beta 1.3.1 on Samsung Galaxy Note I, Android 4.0.3 (WebKit 534). Note: the non-beta is a skin over the Android default browser. The beta uses their own WebKit port.
One
Formerly QQ browser by the Chinese company TenCent. Domestic competitor of UC.
3.5.2 on HTC One X, Android 4.1.1 (WebKit 534)
Tizen
Default browser on Lunchbox prototype by Intel, Tizen 2.0.0a3. (WebKit 537)
NetFront
NetFront, from the Japanese Access company, used to be big on proprietary Samsung and Sony Ericsson systems. It is now switching to WebKit from their own rendering engine. This is NetFront Life 2.3.1 on Sony Xperia S, Android 2.3.7 (WebKit 530)
UC
The largest Chinese browser (though I’m testing the full variant, not the proxy). UC 8.6.1 on Packard Bell tablet, Android 3.2.1. (WebKit 533)
IE9
Default browser on Nokia Lumia 800, Windows Phone 7.
Firefox
18 on HTC One X, Android 4.1.1

General note on One, NetFront, and UC: the browsers I test are not particularly representative for the actual browsers that are used in the wild. Though some may be default browsers on Asian Android devices, most of them get their market share from being pre-installed on feature phones. These installs are unlikely to use the same rendering engine I’m testing. This is the best I can do, though — and all these browser vendors definitely want to expand their market via Android.

Browsers by WebKit version

420
S40
530
NetFront
533
Android 2
Symbian Anna
UC
534
iOS5
Android 3 and 4
BlackBerry 6 and 7
MeeGo
Dolphin
One
535
Chrome
536
iOS6
BlackBerry PlayBook
537
BlackBerry 10
Tizen