How to find DOM elements that cause body overflow

Article autor
September 9, 2025
How to find DOM elements that cause body overflow
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Sometimes you may notice that your website displays an unintended horizontal scrollbar. You may be wondering what is the cause.

Most often this issue is caused by the DOM element being wider than a document.

You can try to find this element in the web inspector, but there is a great and easy JS solution that will console log all elements that go beyond the screen:

var docWidth = document.documentElement.offsetWidth;

[].forEach.call(
  document.querySelectorAll('*'),
  function(el) {
    if (el.offsetWidth > docWidth) {
      console.log(el);
    }
  }
);

That's it, no need to waste your time searching for overflowed elements anymore!

Work with a team that keeps learning and building better software every day.

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