Template:Multicol/doc

Usage

{{Multicol}} is used to start a multi-column section of a page. Between each block of column text insert {{Multicol-break}} and close the last column with {{Multicol-end}}. For example:

 {{Multicol}}
 This text appears in the first column.
 {{Multicol-break}}
 This text appears in the second column.
 {{Multicol-break}}
 This text appears in the third column.
 {{Multicol-end}}

You can have any number of columns. Each column will be the same width, equally dividing the available horizontal space. Each column has a small right margin (20 pixels), creating a "gutter" that prevents text in one column from touching text in the column to its right.

Parameters

This template has two optional parameters: the overall width of the set of columns and the width of the gutter. The overall width of the set of columns can be an absolute value (e.g., 40em) or a percentage of the available page width (e.g., 50%). This parameter defaults to 100%. For example, to create a multi-column section that is only 50% the width of the page:

 {{Multicol|50%}}
 This text appears in the first column.
 {{Multicol-break}}
 This text appears in the second column.
 {{Multicol-break}}
 This text appears in the third column.
 {{Multicol-end}}

The multi-column region is always positioned on the left side of the containing block. To change this, place the above Wikitext in a div block that has the CSS attribute text-align set to either center or right, like this:

 <div style="text-align:center;">{{center|
 {{Multicol|50%}}
 ...
 {{Multicol-end}}
 }}</div>

Related templates

The templates {{Col-begin}} and friends do something similar to this template and its friends, but this template may be easier to use. Each of the following examples produce the same result (a 3-column table in which all columns have equal width):

{{Multicol}} Column 1 {{Multicol-break}} Column 2 {{Multicol-break}} Column 3 {{Multicol-end}}

{{Col-begin}} {{Col-3}} Column 1 {{Col-3}} Column 2 {{Col-3}} Column 3 {{Col-end}}

It's simpler to add more columns to the {{Multicol}} example than to the {{Col-begin}} example, because in the latter case, all occurrences of {{Col-3}} would need to be changed to {{Col-4}}.