20 CSS Link Hover Effect Designs
Background Slide
A solid colour slides up from below the baseline, covering the link as the text colour inverts via mix-blend-mode: difference. Reads like a film cut.
Background Slide the 12th of 20 designs in the 20 CSS Link Hover Effect Designs collection. The design is implemented in pure CSS — no JavaScript required. Copy the HTML and CSS panels below into your project. Because the demo is pure CSS, it works in any framework or templating engine you happen to use. The design honours prefers-reduced-motion and uses real semantic markup, so it ships accessibility-ready out of the box.
Live preview
The code
<a href="#" class="cle-slide"><span>WATCH FILM</span></a>
.cle-slide {
position: relative;
display: inline-block;
padding: 4px 10px;
color: #f0eeff;
font:
700 13px/1.2 ui-monospace,
monospace;
letter-spacing: 0.18em;
text-decoration: none;
overflow: hidden;
isolation: isolate;
}
.cle-slide span {
position: relative;
mix-blend-mode: difference;
color: #fff;
z-index: 1;
}
.cle-slide::before {
content: "";
position: absolute;
left: 0;
right: 0;
bottom: 0;
height: 0;
background: #fff;
transition: height 0.4s cubic-bezier(0.65, 0, 0.35, 1);
z-index: 0;
}
.cle-slide:hover::before,
.cle-slide:focus-visible::before {
height: 100%;
}