CssInspector — CSS Inspector & Editor

CSS Inspector - Click to Inspect Elements Extension Understanding how any web page is styled is essential for developers learning CSS, designers recreating visual effects, QA testers verifying layouts, and anyone who wants to understand how the web works under the surface. Every element on every web page has a set of CSS properties that control its appearance, layout, spacing, and behavior, but these properties are not visible without the right tool to reveal them. CSS Inspector is a browser extension that lets you click on any element on a web page to instantly see its computed and inherited styles, visualize the box model with precise dimensions, copy individual CSS rules for use in your own stylesheets, and maintain a history of elements you have inspected. This extension brings developer tools level inspection capabilities into a streamlined, always-accessible interface that works on any page you visit, making CSS inspection fast, visual, and educational. Features Click-to-Inspect Elements: Activate the inspector mode and click on any element on a web page to instantly select it for detailed inspection. The selected element is highlighted with a colored outline and overlay so you can see exactly which element you are examining and how much space it occupies on the page. The element is identified by its HTML tag name, CSS class names, and ID attribute for clear reference in the inspection panel. Click another element to switch inspection focus, or click the same element again to deselect. Computed Styles: View the complete set of computed CSS styles for any selected element. Computed styles show the final values that the browser actually applies after processing all CSS rules from stylesheets, inline styles, user agent defaults, and inheritance. This includes every CSS property from color and font-size to display, position, margin, padding, border, width, height, transform, transition, animation, and hundreds more. The computed styles view eliminates the guesswork of figuring out which CSS rules are actually taking effect on an element. Inherited Styles: Clearly distinguish which styles are inherited from parent elements versus which are directly applied to the selected element through CSS rules. The inspection panel marks inherited properties differently from directly applied properties, showing you exactly where each style value comes from. Understanding inheritance is crucial for debugging unexpected styling behavior, writing efficient CSS, and learning how the CSS cascade and inheritance system works. Box Model Visualization: View a visual, interactive representation of the element box model showing content dimensions, padding on all four sides, border width on all four sides, and margin on all four sides. The box model diagram displays exact pixel values for each section and makes it easy to understand how much total space an element occupies and how its spacing is calculated by the browser. Hover over each section of the box model diagram to highlight the corresponding area on the actual web page, providing a visual connection between the numbers and the rendered output. CSS Rule Extraction: Copy individual CSS rules from any element. Select specific properties to copy or copy all computed styles as a complete CSS rule block. The copied CSS is properly formatted with correct syntax and ready to paste directly into your stylesheet. This is invaluable for learning from professional designs, recreating specific visual effects, or quickly capturing styling patterns you see on websites you admire. Style Specificity Information: See which CSS rules are being applied to an element and which are being overridden due to CSS specificity, source order, or the cascade. The specificity view shows the specificity weight of each applied rule, helping you understand why some styles take precedence over others. Understanding specificity is one of the most important concepts in CSS, and seeing it visualized makes the concept concrete and understandable. Media Query Detection: Identify which CSS media queries are currently active for the viewport size, orientation, and other media features. The media query inspector shows all media rules that match the current browser state, including responsive breakpoints for width, height, min-width, max-width, orientation, and prefers-color-scheme. This is essential for responsive design debugging and understanding how layouts and styles adapt to different screen sizes and device orientations. Pseudo-Class and Pseudo-Element Styles: Inspect styles applied by CSS pseudo-classes such as hover, focus, active, visited, first-child, last-child, nth-child, checked, disabled, and required. View pseudo-element styles for content generated by CSS including before and after content, first-line, first-letter, and placeholder. Understanding pseudo-class and pseudo-element styling is important for interactive states and generated content. Style History: The extension maintains a comprehensive history of elements you have inspected on the current page and across pages. Navigate back to previously inspected elements without having to re-locate and re-click them on the page. The history is organized by page URL and element position, making it easy to return to any element you examined earlier in your session. The history persists throughout your browsing session. Copy as CSS Selector: Copy the CSS selector path for any inspected element with one click. The selector is generated at an appropriate specificity level, providing options from simple tag selectors to highly specific paths with classes, IDs, and structural selectors. Use the copied selector to target the same element in your stylesheets, JavaScript code, or testing frameworks. The selector generation provides multiple specificity options. Style Comparison: Compare the CSS properties of two elements side by side in a comparison view. Select one element, then select another to see a difference view that hi…