stroke

<color>

Sets the painting of the stroke with any valid CSS color value.

<image>

Sets the painting of the stroke with what SVG calls a paint server, which in this context is an SVG gradient or pattern. CSS gradients cannot be used with the stroke property.

context-stroke

Causes an element to "inherit" its stroke definition from its context element. If there is no valid context element, then this value will result in no paint being used for the stroke.

stroke = 
  <paint>  

<paint> = 
  none         |
  <image>      |
  <svg-paint>  

<image> = 
  <url>       |
  <gradient>  

<svg-paint> = 
  child               |
  child( <integer> )  

<url> = 
  <url()>  |
  <src()>  

<url()> = 
  url( <string> <url-modifier>* )  |
  <url-token>                      

<src()> = 
  src( <string> <url-modifier>* )  

In this example, we create two different shapes, a circle and a rectangle, which are part of a <g> (group) that has a gray stroke color as a default for the two shapes.

<svg>
  <g fill="none" stroke="gray" stroke-width="10">
    <circle cx="100" cy="100" r="40" />
    <rect x="20" y="20" width="80" height="80" />
  </g>
</svg>

Via CSS, we then apply a dusky purple color to the rectangle and a red to the circle.

rect {
  stroke: hsl(270deg 50% 40%);
}
circle {
  stroke: red;
}

This example uses the same group and shapes (with the circle moved over a bit) as seen in the previous example, but also has an SVG pattern defined.

<svg>
  <g fill="none" stroke="gray" stroke-width="23">
    <circle cx="150" cy="90" r="40" />
    <rect x="20" y="20" width="80" height="80" />
  </g>
  <defs>
    <pattern id="star" viewBox="0,0,10,10" width="10%" height="10%">
      <polygon points="0,0 2,5 0,10 5,8 10,10 8,5 10,0 5,2" />
    </pattern>
  </defs>
</svg>

The pattern is then referenced in the CSS with a URL value pointing to the ID of the pattern. This pattern is applied to both shapes as a stroking paint, with the result shown.

rect,
circle {
  stroke: url(#star);
}

The pattern is drawn relative to the shapes' bounding boxes, which can lead to visual interference where they overlap, because parts of the pattern are transparent.

Here, we once again use the same group-and-shapes markup as the first example, but also add a definition for an SVG gradient.

<svg>
  <g fill="none" stroke="gray" stroke-width="10">
    <circle cx="100" cy="100" r="40" />
    <rect x="20" y="20" width="80" height="80" />
  </g>
  <defs>
    <linearGradient id="greenwhite">
      <stop offset="0%" stop-color="green" />
      <stop offset="100%" stop-color="white" />
    </linearGradient>
  </defs>
</svg>

In the CSS, we apply that SVG gradient to the rectangle using a URL value pointing to the ID of the linear gradient. To the circle, we apply a CSS linear gradient that is equivalent in intent to the SVG gradient.

rect {
  stroke: url(#greenwhite);
}
circle {
  stroke: linear-gradient(90deg, green, white);
}

Only the rectangle receives a gradient stroke, whereas the circle falls back to the gray stroke set by the group element. This happens because CSS gradients are not valid values for the stroke property, whereas URL references to SVG gradients are permitted.

In this case, we again start with a group element, inside of which two rectangle-shaped paths are defined. After that, a linear gradient and an SVG marker are defined.

<svg>
  <g fill="none" stroke="gray" stroke-width="4">
    <path d="M 20,20 l 180,0 0,100 -180,0 z" />
    <path d="M 100,40 l 180,0 0,100 -180,0 z" />
  </g>
  <defs>
    <linearGradient id="orangered">
      <stop offset="0%" stop-color="orange" />
      <stop offset="100%" stop-color="red" />
    </linearGradient>
    <marker
      id="circle"
      markerWidth="20"
      markerHeight="20"
      refX="10"
      refY="10"
      markerUnits="userSpaceOnUse">
      <circle
        cx="10"
        cy="10"
        r="8"
        stroke-width="4"
        stroke="none"
        fill="none" />
    </marker>
  </defs>
</svg>

We then write CSS to add a marker to both paths, and also to have a dusky purple stroke color. This is overridden for the second path, which is given a URL value to apply the orange-to-red gradient as its stroke. Finally, we set the circle element in the marker element to have a stroke value of context-stroke.

path {
  stroke: hsl(270deg 50% 40%);
  marker: url(#circle);
}
path:nth-of-type(2) {
  stroke: url(#orangered);
}
marker circle {
  stroke: context-stroke;
}

Because stroke-context is being applied to an element that descends from a <marker> element, the context element for every circle is the element that called the <marker> element; that is, the <path> elements. The result is that the markers on the first path use the color of the calling path, and are purple. The markers on the second path, by contrast, use the same orange-to-red SVG gradient the path uses. This latter case illustrates how SVG gradients are applied as a single gradient to the entire shape, rather than being applied independently to each individual part of the shape.

• stroke-dasharray
• stroke-dashoffset
• stroke-linecap
• stroke-linejoin
• stroke-miterlimit
• stroke-opacity
• stroke-width
• paint-order
• SVG stroke attribute