Fluid Responsive Design is a responsive design pattern that leverages CSS Clamp instead of the traditional
breakpoint media queries.
In short, CSS Clamp is a CSS function that allows us to define a range of values (minimum, preferred, maximum). Based on
the viewport size, the preferred value will then scale automatically within the minimum and maximum.
Let’s now bring CSS Clamp into our Tailwind CSS configuration. To begin, we’ll add clamps for our font sizes:
When using these new fluid font size classes, the clamp will grow/shrink the font size in relation to the viewport. No
need to worry about multiple breakpoints anymore! text-base md:text-xl xl:text-2xl → text-fluid-2
Now that we have fluid font sizes, let’s add clamps for our fluid spacing. By setting Tailwind
Spacing , we gain fluid spacing for padding, margin, width, height, maxWidth, maxHeight, gap, inset,
space, and translate. p-2 m-3 md:p-4 md:m-4 xl:p-6 xl:m-6 → p-fluid-1 m-fluid-2
With our fluid responsive design configured, lets jump back to our original HTML to remove those breakpoints:
As you can see, the HTML becomes far less bloated. The font sizes, paddings, and margins only need to be defined once
without having multiple breakpoints. All while keeping the conveniences of Tailwind CSS!
Bonus! If your using Utopia, there’s a tailwindcss plugin for it. Check it out here:
tailwindcss-utopia