Replaced Elements

Conformance: requirements and recommendations

Replaced element
An element whose content is outside the scope of the CSS formatting model, such as an image, embedded document, or applet. For example, the content of the HTML IMG element is often replaced by the image that its "src" attribute designates. Replaced elements often have intrinsic dimensions: an intrinsic width, an intrinsic height, and an intrinsic ratio. For example, a bitmap image has an intrinsic width and an intrinsic height specified in absolute units (from which the intrinsic ratio can obviously be determined). On the other hand, other documents may not have any intrinsic dimensions (for example a blank HTML document).
User agents may consider a replaced element to not have any intrinsic dimensions if it is believed that those dimensions could leak sensitive information to a third party. For example, if an HTML document changed intrinsic size depending on the user's bank balance, then the UA might want to act as if that resource had no intrinsic dimensions.

Intrinsic dimensions
The width and height as defined by the element itself, not imposed by the surroundings. CSS does not define how the intrinsic dimensions are found. In CSS 2.1 only replaced elements can come with intrinsic dimensions. For raster images without reliable resolution information, a size of 1 px unit per image source pixel must be assumed.