A Guide to a Modern CSS Reset (2026 Edition)
Every project starts the same way: fighting the browser's default agent styles. Margins on <body>, box-sizing: content-box, and weird font sizing.
Here is a battle-tested, minimal reset for modern web development.
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The Reset Code
/* 1. Use a more intuitive box-sizing model. */
*, *::before, *::after {
box-sizing: border-box;
}
/* 2. Remove default margin */
* {
margin: 0;
}
/* 3. Allow percentage-based heights in the application */
html, body {
height: 100%;
}
/* 4. Improve typography defaults */
body {
line-height: 1.5;
-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased;
}
/* 5. Improve media defaults */
img, picture, video, canvas, svg {
display: block;
max-width: 100%;
}
/* 6. Inherit fonts for form controls */
input, button, textarea, select {
font: inherit;
}
/* 7. Avoid text overflows */
p, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6 {
overflow-wrap: break-word;
}
Deep Dive: Why box-sizing: border-box?
By default, CSS uses content-box. If you set width: 100px and padding: 20px, the actual rendered width is 140px (100 + 20 + 20).
With border-box, width: 100px means the final width is 100px, and the padding pushes the content inward. This makes responsive design mathematically possible.
Deep Dive: Media Defaults
img tags are inline by default, which causes a mysterious "gap" at the bottom of images (due to line-height). Setting display: block fixes this instantly.
img {
display: block;
max-width: 100%; /* Prevent horizontal scrolling */
}
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Test Your Knowledge
Why is 'box-sizing: border-box' preferred over the default 'content-box'?
Conclusion
You don't need a heavy library like Normalize.css anymore. Browsers are much more consistent today. A small 20-line snippet is usually enough to standardize your baseline.
Md Nasim Sheikh
Software Developer at softexForge