transition-property, implied values; mobile

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Transitions only work on CSS declarations that have a numerical value; such as left: 20px to left: 200px. However, there are a few cases where a CSS declaration may have an implied value. This page discusses and tests them.

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

Compatibility

Click or touch the test elements. If they change styles immediately, transitions are not supported on the indicated CSS declaration. Instead, they should change slowly.

Then click or touch the test element again. It should transition back in most circumstances.

iOS Android Chromium UC BlackBerry Nokia Xpress UC Mini Opera Nintendo Dolphin IE Firefox
7 8 2 4 Sa Puf Cy Xia Op Go 9 10 6 7 10 Mini Classic 9 10 11 And OS
background-color
Test
Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes - Yes - Yes Yes

All browsers interpet background-color: transparent as opacity: 0. Thus the color value itself doesn’t do a transition: it goes from undefined to red in one step. The opacity, however, transitions from 0 to 1.

border
Test
Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes - Almost Yes - Yes Yes

When doing the test you’ll see that all browsers handle the first one, from none to a border, correctly, but don’t do the second one, from border to none, at all.

What’s going on here is that the first transition sets the border-style from none to solid. This is not a transition: the new style is applied directly. However, the border-color transitions from the text color to red and border-width from 0 to 5.

When going the other way, the border-style is immediately set to none, which hides the border and thus makes the color and width transition invisibile.

Thus, although the test may seem to have weird effects, the browsers actually do the right thing.

  • Opera Classic switches the border-color to transparent straight away, but then transitions the border-width.
left
Test
Should not work
Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes - No Yes - No No

The default left value is not 0 but auto, which is not a numerical value and thus untransitionable.

letter-spacing
Test
Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes - Yes - Yes No

The default letter-spacing is normal, which should compute to 0, which is transitionable. Therefore Firefox appears to be in the wrong here.

outline
Test
Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes - Yes - No Incomplete

outline should work the same as border; see above.

  • Firefox doesn’t transition outline-width from its implied 0 value to 5; it just transitions the color.
text-indent
Test Test Test Test Test Test Test Test
Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes - Yes - No Yes

text-indent always has a numeric value (default is 0), so IE’s refusal to transition is a bug.

iOS Android Chromium UC BlackBerry Nokia Xpress UC Mini Opera Nintendo Dolphin IE Firefox
7 8 2 4 Sa Puf Cy Xia Op Go 9 10 6 7 10 Mini Classic 9 10 11 And OS

Tested browsers

Mobile browser test array 2.0.2; November 2014

Version 2.x has quite a few changes from 1.3; see my notes.

iOS 7
WebKit 537
Default browser on iPad 2 with iOS 7.1.2
iOS 8
WebKit 600
Default browser on iPhone 4S with iOS 8.1
Android 2
WebKit 533
Default browser on HTC Legend, Android 2.2
Default browser on Samsung Galaxy Pocket, Android 2.3.6
Default browser on Sony Reader PRS-T3. I’ve heard it’s Android 2-based, but of course it’s nearly impossible to get some actual information.
Android 4
WebKit 534
Default browser on Huawei C8813, Android 4.1.1
Default browser on Samsung Galaxy Note I, Android 4.1.2
Default browser on Sony Xperia S, Android 4.1.2
Default browser on LG L5, Android 4.1.2
Default browser on Wolfgang AT-AS45FW, Android 4.2.2 (see note below)
Default browser on HTC One X, Android 4.2.2
Default browser on HTC M8, Android 4.4.2
Chromium Samsung
Blink; Chromium 28
Default browser on Samsung Galaxy S4, Android 4.4.2
This is Samsung’s Chrome.
Chromium Puffin
Blink; Chromium 30
Possibly proxy-ish browser; doesn’t make connection to my internal server, but does do some stuff client-side.
4.0 Free Edition on Samsung Galaxy Note, Android 4.1.2
Chromium Cyanogen
Blink; Chromium 33
Default browser on Galaxy Nexus flashed with Cyanogenmod 11, Android 4.4.4
This is Cyanogen’s Chrome.
Chromium Xiaomi
Blink; Chromium 34 or 35; see this blog post
Default browser on Xiaomi M2, Android 4.1.1
Chromium Opera
Blink; Chromium 38
25 on LG L5, Android 4.1.2
25 on HTC M8, Android 4.4.2
This is Opera Mobile.
Chromium Google
Blink; Chromium 38
Default browser on Nexus 7, Android 4.4.2
Default browser on Motorola Moto G, Android 4.4.4
This is Google’s regular Chrome. I test it only on devices where it is the default browser.
UC 9
WebKit 534
UC 9.9.5 on Huawei C8813, Android 4.1.1
UC 9.9.6 on Xiaomi M2, Android 4.1.1
The largest Chinese browser. This is the full Chinese variant, not the proxy. These browsers were pre-installed (next to Android WebKit; don’t ask me why).
UC 10
UC 10.0 on Samsung Galaxy S4, Android 4.4.2
This is an English install. I don’t know if that matters, but it could.
BlackBerry 6
WebKit 534
Default browser on BB Torch 9800 (OS6)
BlackBerry 7
WebKit 534
Default browser on BB Torch 9810 (OS7)
BlackBerry 10
WebKit 537
Default browser on BlackBerry Z10 (BB OS 10.1)
A new BB10 version has been released, but my device cannot connect to the update server.
This device has 1GB of internal memory instead of the customary 2GB, which may matter in performance tests.
Nokia Xpress
Gecko 20100401; this version was used for some Firefoxes from 3 to 4.
Proxy browser
5.5 on the Nokia Asha 311, S40.
UC Mini
Gecko; don’t know version number
Proxy browser
8.8 on HTC One X, Android 4.2.2
9.4 on Motorola Moto G, Android 4.4.2
9.4 on Wolfgang AT-AS45FW, Android 4.2.2 (see note below)
Opera Mini
Presto
Proxy browser
7.6 on Samsung Galaxy S4, Android 4.4.2
8.0 on BB Torch 9800 (OS6)
8.0.3 on iPad 2, iOS 7.1.2
Opera Classic
Presto
12.10 on Samsung Galaxy Pocket, Android 2.3.6
Nintendo
WebKit 536
Nintendo browser 3.0.3 on Wii U (OS version unfindable)
Supposed to be based on NetFront, which in turn is WebKit-based nowadays.
Dolphin
WebKit 534
Dolphin 11.23 with JetPack on Sony Xperia S, Android 4.1.2.
Independent full browser for Android, as long as you install both Dolphin and the Jetpack extension.
IE9
Trident
Default browser on Nokia Lumia 800, Windows Phone 7.5.
IE10
Trident
Default browser on Nokia Lumia 520, Windows Phone 8.0.
IE11
Trident
Default browser on Nokia Lumia 820, Windows Phone 8.1 “Update”
This is a developer phone. That might matter.

Firefox Android
Gecko 32
32 on LG L5, Android 4.1.2
32 on Samsung Galaxy S4, Android 4.4.2
Firefox OS
Gecko 28
Default browser on T2Mobile Flame, the FFOS reference device. 1.3.0 prerelease

Wolfgang AT-AS45FW note: Wolfgang is a Dutch importer and re-brander of phones. In this particular case they seem to have bought Chinese (? probably) phones, re-branded them, then re-sold them to the Whoop company, which re-branded them and sold them to the Hema chain of supermarkets, which sells them to consumers as the Whoop Echo. Supply chain management FTW!