The CanvasRenderingContext2D.textAlign
property of the Canvas 2D API specifies the current text alignment used when drawing text.
The alignment is relative to the x
value of the fillText()
method. For example, if textAlign
is "center"
, then the text's left edge will be at x - (textWidth / 2)
.
Possible values:
"left"
-
The text is left-aligned.
"right"
-
The text is right-aligned.
"center"
-
The text is centered.
"start"
-
The text is aligned at the normal start of the line (left-aligned for left-to-right locales, right-aligned for right-to-left locales).
"end"
-
The text is aligned at the normal end of the line (right-aligned for left-to-right locales, left-aligned for right-to-left locales).
The default value is "start"
.
This example demonstrates the three "physical" values of the textAlign
property: "left"
, "center"
, and "right"
.
HTML
<canvas id="canvas"></canvas>
JavaScript
const canvas = document.getElementById("canvas");
canvas.width = 350;
const ctx = canvas.getContext("2d");
const x = canvas.width / 2;
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.moveTo(x, 0);
ctx.lineTo(x, canvas.height);
ctx.stroke();
ctx.font = "30px serif";
ctx.textAlign = "left";
ctx.fillText("left-aligned", x, 40);
ctx.textAlign = "center";
ctx.fillText("center-aligned", x, 85);
ctx.textAlign = "right";
ctx.fillText("right-aligned", x, 130);
Result
This example demonstrates the two direction-dependent values of the textAlign
property: "start"
and "end"
. Note that the direction
property is manually specified as "ltr"
, although this is also the default for English-language text.
HTML
<canvas id="canvas"></canvas>
JavaScript
const canvas = document.getElementById("canvas");
const ctx = canvas.getContext("2d");
ctx.font = "30px serif";
ctx.direction = "ltr";
ctx.textAlign = "start";
ctx.fillText("Start-aligned", 0, 50);
ctx.textAlign = "end";
ctx.fillText("End-aligned", canvas.width, 120);
Result