Using 2D Transformation Functions in CSS: A Complete Guide


Is your website lagging behind your competitor’s website even though you have been delivering better services and using the right marketing strategies? Well, in that case, the overall design of your website is the real culprit!

The advanced web development services have significantly unleashed ample possibilities that can eventually enhance the user experience. With the precise utilization of designing skills and adequate functions in CSS, one can unquestionably create a magnum opus!

A lot of development companies these days are emphasizing building the websites that aren’t serving the purpose alone but actually offering rich user experience. Whether you are on a hunt for the right design that can augment your business website or looking for a decent yet engaging blog layout, you must consider including transformation functions!

Check out this quick guide to using 2D Transformations that is quite helpful for the beginners out there seeking an optimal solution for including these functions in their website.

Why Use 2D Transformations:

Transformations in your website could enhance the overall appeal of your website in a way that you can engage the audience and certainly generate leads. The effects and interactions can simply catch anyone’s attention and make you stand out of the league! Skew, rotate, scale, and translate are four major transformation functions that you can use to enhance the overall appeal of your website.

2D transforms of CSS is a perfect way to enhance the overall appeal of the website in a way that it attracts users that can be converted into leads. These functions are quite helpful for the beginners that are seeking the perfect examples to start with including transforms in their website. Dive in here to know more about the basic transform functions and how you can include them in your website for superior appeal.

Translate Functions:

The translate functions allow the movement of an element from its actual position. This function accepts the values for x and y. For example:

”transform: translate (-150%, 90px)”;”

The above example clearly depicts the movement of the element 150% to the left and 90px down. For the ones that need to move the element to either side can eventually use the TranslateY or TranslateX as per their actual needs.

This property is quite useful when it comes to moving the element in any direction with precise margins as provided by the developer.

scale, scaleX, and scaleY:

The scale provides transformation of the dimensions of an element and its child. One can expect to scale in all the direction, which can also be used to make any of the elements as much as required by the developer.

One can also prefer passing any of the two parameters that can help in scaling the element in either direction. This simply implies one can either scale vertically or horizontally or even both.

transform: scale(1, 2.5);

One can always use scaleY or even scaleX if they wish to focus on one dimension. A negative value could help in creating a mirror image of the element. These kinds of effects are currently trending when it comes to developing appealing website designs. One can include the scale transformation by first analyzing the needs and the effects they need to showcase. It would be great if you consider consulting a renowned professional that has a good experience and expertise in augmenting your CSS designing needs.


You would be aware of what a rotate transformation would be doing in your design. Yes, it would rotate the element as per the requirements. The developer can provide the angle in degrees to ensure that the element rotates as specified.

For instance: transform: rotate(40deg);

The developer needs to know that a positive value would rotate the element in a clockwise direction while negative value would do the same in the anti-clockwise direction. One can also change the behavior of the element by considering the transform-origin approach. This approach is useful to move in different directions- bottom, top, left, right, and center. For instance:

Transform-origin: right bottom;

This line would certainly move the element in the bottom right direction. One can adjust the position of the element as per their exact requirements. Some of the complex designing techniques entirely rely on the rotation of the element. For this, you should prefer relying on an experienced professional that can bring the best out of your imagination and ideas.

skewY and skewX Transformations

One can now skew to the vertical or horizontal axis as per their actual needs with the use of skew skeyX or skewY transformations respectively. The developer again needs to provide the angle in degrees up to which the skew is required. For instance:

transform: skewY(20deg);

This would skew the element to 20 degrees in the Y plane with adequate precision as per the command.

Multiple Transformations:

You can use multiple transformations functions as you wish to pass the functions to the properties if they are actually distinct with whitespaces. These kinds of transformations are widely used by the developers around the globe to include diverse functionalities to the elements on their website.

You can always use this transformation property to transform the element by altering the rotation, skew, and scale. Here is an example that would surely clear all your doubts regarding the multiple transformations:

transform: skewY(-10deg) rotate(21deg) scale(1);

The above example clearly depicts the skew transformation of the element to -10degrees, rotate the element to 21 degrees and scale to unit 1. You can choose the preferences as per your designing needs, which can help you in making a great website that can engage users with adequate use of transformations.

For all the advanced users out there, you can eventually add transformations by using an adequate matrix function. For this, you need to precisely examine your exact needs and then pass the commands. The matrix function can be invoked by passing six parameters in your code. This includes four parameters for the transformation to take place and the remaining two for scaling the dimension. Here is a great example of the same:

transform: matrix(2.0,0.7,1,2,41,21);

The above example clearly showcases the way you can utilize matrix function for augmenting the transformation for your website. Most of the designing ninjas that don’t compromise on the quality of their efforts in writing the efficient code prefer this method that perfectly bump-ups the user experience of their website.

What if you Wish to Disable the Transformations?


You can always disable the transformations for your website if you don’t want any transformation in your website. For this, you simply need to add this code:

Transform: none

This would ensure that there are no running transformations in your website, which can be later utilized by removing this code or making it a comment in your code.


Transforms let you invoke the potential of advanced designing that further helps you in including the functionality that otherwise impossible to add. The animations and the effects created with these transforms are eye-catching enough to enhance client engagement.

The above-mentioned functions are quite useful for the developers and beginners out there that are struggling enough to find the right ways to include transforms in their website.

About Author

Diwas is a self-professed ‘writer by birth’, and holds a Degree in Journalism and a Diploma in Integrated Marketing that complement his innate abilities. He is also a Hubspot certified Content Marketer and has worked with numerous publications in the print-media before switching to the digital world. He is a firm believer in team work; for him, it is not just the idea, but also the team’s buy-in into the idea, that makes a campaign successful!

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