I Stopped Using JavaScript for Menus

HTML and CSS now handles what JS used to

Tushar Kanjariya

4 min read

·

Jan 2, 2026

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For years, I wrote the same 100 lines of JavaScript every time I needed a dropdown.

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Calculate position. Track scroll. Handle resize. Fix mobile bugs. Add escape key logic. Patch the weird stuff that only breaks in production.

Not because I liked it.

Because I thought I had no choice.

Then one day, while playing with modern CSS, I realized something uncomfortable:

The browser was already doing the hard part.

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The real problem with menus

Menus are simple UI elements.

They just need to:

• Open near the trigger
• Stay attached while scrolling
• Never overflow the screen
• Close correctly

Yet we’ve been solving this with JavaScript math for years.

Mostly because CSS couldn’t express intent.

Now it can.

Native popover changed everything