Media type · text/css
text/css
text/css is the media type for Cascading Style Sheets.
Key facts
| Type | text/css |
|---|---|
| Extensions | .css |
| Standard | CSS Snapshot; RFC 9110 |
| Text or binary | Text |
| Browser behavior | Applied as a stylesheet |
What text/css is
It identifies a stylesheet that the browser applies to a document. The type is required for stylesheets loaded with <link rel="stylesheet"> in standards mode: browsers perform strict MIME checking and ignore a stylesheet served with the wrong type.
Why stylesheets silently fail
A common failure is a server or CDN serving .css as text/plain or application/octet-stream. The file loads with 200 in the network panel, but the page stays unstyled. Check the response Content-Type, not the file content. The charset parameter is optional; @charset inside the file also declares the encoding.
Frequently asked questions
Why is my CSS not applied although it returns 200?
The response probably has the wrong Content-Type. Browsers refuse to apply stylesheets that are not served as text/css in standards mode.
Does text/css support charset?
Yes. charset=utf-8 is valid, and the @charset rule inside the file is an alternative declaration.