Gradients, Blend Modes, And A Really Cool Hover Effect — Smashing Magazine

Do you know how box-shadow is sometimes used as a hover effect? It adds depth to something, like a button, and can create the impression that it is being pressed into the page.

Gradients are also capable of adding depth. They are often used to make something appear as if it’s popping off the page.

I wanted to see if a gradient could make for an interesting hover effect. Not exactly like a button with a box shadow, but maybe it can be done in a way that changes an element’s state in addition to other elements around it.

Here’s what I’m thinking:

See that? The hover state is on one of the items, but all items are affected by the change. The hovered element has the darkest, boldest background, while a gradient covers the rest of the items and de-emphasizes them with lighter shades of the same color.

Now, I’ll immediately point out that hover states should rely on more than changing colors to indicate a change. That demo is purely meant to showcase the effect, but I would consider additional visual cues if I were using this in production.

But let’s break this apart to see...