ul – unordered list

ul

For technical reasons, the title of this article is not the text used to call this API. Instead, use ul

Summary

The ul element is used to define an unordered list. The element encloses one or more list items, enclosed in li elements.

Overview Table

DOM Interface: HTMLUListElement

Permitted contents	One of the following: Either: Zero or more li elements. Or: A template element. Or: any combination of the above two
Permitted parents	Any element that can contain [flow content](/w/index.php?title=html/concepts/flowContent&action=edit&redlink=1).
Tag omission	A ul element must have both a start tag and an end tag.

The **unordered list**, represented by the **ul** element, is most often used to group a list of items, enclosed in [**li**](/html/elements/li) elements, together in a semantic way. Usually, the order in which the items are presented is not important.

Examples

This example uses the ul element to create a bulleted list.

<ul>
  <li>Alice</li>
  <li>Bob</li>
  <li>Carol</li>
</ul>

Example with nested lists

<ul>
  <li>Alice <ul>
    <li>Red</li>
    <li>Green</li>
  </ul>
  </li>
  <li>Bob <ul>
    <li>Green</li>
    <li>Cyan</li>
  </ul></li>
  <li>Carol <ul>
    <li>Magenta</li>
    <li>Yellow</li>
  </ul></li>
</ul>

Typical browser default CSS properties for the ul element.

display: block;
list-style-type: disc;
margin-top: 16px;
margin-bottom: 16px;

Notes

Remarks

The type attribute sets the list type for all ensuing lists unless a different type value is set. The ul element inherits its line-height from the height of the font attribute for the body. For example, if the font-size attribute for the body is larger than the font-size attribute for the ul element, the list items in the ul are spaced according to the font-size of the body.

Related specifications

HTML 5.1: W3C Working Draft
HTML 5: W3C Recommendation
HTML 4.01: W3C Recommendation

Microsoft Developer Network: [Windows Internet Explorer API reference Article]