CSS Formatter
Free online CSS formatter and CSS beautifier to turn messy or minified CSS into clean, readable code. Choose indentation, brace style and comment handling — or switch to CSS minifier mode for production. Works on CSS, SCSS and Less. No signup, runs entirely in your browser.
Paste Your CSS
Minified, messy or hand-writtenCtrl+Enter (or Cmd+Enter) inside the textarea to beautify instantly. Works for SCSS and Less for basic formatting.
Output
Ready when you areYour formatted or minified CSS will appear here
Paste some CSS and click Beautify CSS or Minify CSS.
What does this CSS Formatter do?
This free online CSS formatter — also called a CSS beautifier or CSS pretty printer — takes minified, compressed or poorly formatted CSS and rewrites it with consistent indentation, spacing and line breaks so it is readable and editable. Paste the output of a build tool, a design export from Figma, or a legacy stylesheet, and you get clean CSS you can actually work with.
The same tool works in reverse. Switch to CSS minifier mode and it collapses your stylesheet into the smallest possible single-line form, stripping comments and unnecessary whitespace. That is exactly what you want for production: smaller files, faster downloads, and a better PageSpeed score.
Everything runs locally in your browser. The CSS you paste never leaves your device, there is no signup, and there are no usage limits. Format or minify as much CSS as you want, as many times as you want, for personal or commercial projects.
How to format and beautify CSS code
- Paste your CSS into the input box on the left. You can paste minified CSS, hand-written CSS, or SCSS/Less.
- Choose your options. Pick the indentation size (2 spaces, 4 spaces or tab), brace style (expanded or compact) and whether to keep or strip comments.
- Click Beautify CSS. The formatter rewrites your CSS with consistent indentation and line breaks. The output appears instantly in the panel on the right.
- Or click Minify CSS for production. The output collapses to the smallest possible single-line form, and the stats panel shows how many bytes you saved.
- Copy or download the result using the buttons above the output. Copy Output puts it on your clipboard; Download .css saves it as a file.
Why use this CSS Formatter?
Instant formatting
The formatter runs entirely in your browser, so the output appears the moment you click. No server round-trip, no waiting.
Configurable style
Choose 2-space, 4-space or tab indentation. Switch between expanded and compact brace style. Toggle comment preservation on or off.
Beautify + minify
One tool does both: expand minified CSS for reading, or compress readable CSS for production. The stats panel shows exactly how many bytes you saved.
SCSS and Less aware
The formatter uses a CSS-aware tokenizer that understands nested braces, so SCSS and Less files format reasonably well without a compiler.
100% private
Everything runs in your browser. The CSS you paste never leaves your device — no server, no logs, no tracking.
Works offline
Once the page loads, you can format or minify CSS without an internet connection. Bookmark it for offline work.
Who uses a CSS formatter?
This CSS beautifier online is used by front-end developers, designers, SEO engineers and students. Some of the most common use cases:
Front-end developers
- Format minified CSS from a production build to debug a styling issue
- Beautify CSS exported from Figma, Sketch or other design tools
- Standardise indentation across a legacy stylesheet before a refactor
- Minify CSS before shipping to production to reduce file size
- Format SCSS or Less files for readability without opening an IDE
Web designers and no-code builders
- Clean up CSS custom code added to a website builder or CMS
- Format CSS snippets from tutorials before adding them to a project
- Minify custom CSS to reduce page weight on a no-code site
SEO and performance engineers
- Minify CSS to improve Core Web Vitals and PageSpeed scores
- Compare input and output byte counts to report compression savings
- Format CSS to audit for unused rules and optimisation opportunities
Students and learners
- Format minified CSS from a course example to understand the structure
- See how indentation and brace style affect readability
- Practice writing clean CSS with consistent formatting
CSS beautify vs. CSS minify — what is the difference?
These two operations are opposites, and this tool does both.
| Mode | What it does | Best for | Typical size change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Beautify / Format | Adds indentation, line breaks and spacing. Expands compact CSS into a readable structure. | Development, debugging, code review, learning | Increases file size (adds whitespace) |
| Minify | Removes whitespace, comments and unnecessary characters. Collapses CSS to a single line. | Production deployment, performance optimisation | 20–60% smaller |
If you have readable CSS and need to shrink it for production — reducing file size and page load time — use the CSS Minifier mode. If you have minified CSS and need to understand it, use Beautify CSS.
CSS formatting best practices
Whatever style you choose, keep it consistent. Here are the conventions most teams follow:
- One property per line. Makes diffs cleaner and merge conflicts easier to resolve.
- Consistent indentation. 2 spaces is the most common choice in modern CSS; 4 spaces is common in older codebases.
- Expanded braces. Opening brace on its own line is the classic style; compact (same line) saves vertical space.
- Space after colon.
color: red;rather thancolor:red;for readability. - Blank line between rules. Gives visual breathing room between selectors.
- Group related properties. Position, box model, typography, then visual.
- Comment complex sections. Especially media queries and vendor-specific hacks.