Description

If you need to ensure that the contents of a cell, in this case a table header, always remain as they are, and don’t wrap, use the nowrap attribute. Note that this attribute, which is now deprecated, has a much better alternative in the form of the CSS property white-space (which can be set to "nowrap").

The example HTML shows the nowrap attribute used in an XHTML-compliant way, but it could equally be expressed in HTML 4.01, as follows:

<th nowrap>Car manufacturer (make)</th>

The effect of using this attribute can be seen in Figure 1. Note that it may not always be a wise idea to use nowrap—the image shows a browser window at a reduced size, displaying two versions of the table. In the first version, the nowrap attribute is omitted and the browser reflows the text; in the second version, nowrap forces the text to remain in place, causing the table to disappear off the page, as evidenced by the horizontal scrollbar and missing text.

Figure 1. Two tables, one without, and one with, the nowrap attribute set on the headers

Value

"nowrap" is the only value this attribute can take.

Compatibility

Excellent browser support is provided for this attribute, but given that this is a deprecated attribute, you should opt for the CSS alternative instead (th {white-space: nowrap;}).