Is there anyway to animate an ellipsis with CSS animations?

Question

I\'m trying to have an ellipsis animate, and was wondering if it was possible with CSS animations...

So it might be like

Loading...
Loading..
Loading.
Lo         


        

Answer 1

Here is my solution with pure css https://jsfiddle.net/pduc6jx5/1/ explained: https://medium.com/@lastseeds/create-text-ellipsis-animation-with-pure-css-7f61acee69cc

scss

.dot1 {
 animation: visibility 3s linear infinite;
}

@keyframes visibility {
 0% {
 opacity: 1;
 }
 65% {
 opacity: 1;
 }
 66% {
 opacity: 0;
 }
 100% {
 opacity: 0;
 }
}

.dot2 {
 animation: visibility2 3s linear infinite;
}

@keyframes visibility2 {
 0% {
  opacity: 0;
 }
 21% {
  opacity: 0;
 }
 22% {
  opacity: 1;
 }
 65% {
  opacity: 1;
 }
 66% {
  opacity: 0;
 }
 100% {
  opacity: 0;
 }
}

.dot3 {
 animation: visibility3 3s linear infinite;
}

@keyframes visibility3 {
 0% {
  opacity: 0;
 }
 43% {
  opacity: 0;
 }
 44% {
  opacity: 1;
 }
 65% {
  opacity: 1;
 }
 66% {
  opacity: 0;
 }
 100% {
  opacity: 0;
 }
}

html

Loading <span class="dot dot1">.</span><span class="dot dot2">.</span><span class="dot dot3">.</span>

Answer 2

How about a slightly modified version of @xec's answer: http://codepen.io/thetallweeks/pen/yybGra

HTML

A single class added to the element:

<div class="loading">Loading</div>

CSS

Animation that uses steps. See MDN docs

.loading:after {
  overflow: hidden;
  display: inline-block;
  vertical-align: bottom;
  -webkit-animation: ellipsis steps(4,end) 900ms infinite;      
  animation: ellipsis steps(4,end) 900ms infinite;
  content: "\2026"; /* ascii code for the ellipsis character */
  width: 0px;
}

@keyframes ellipsis {
  to {
    width: 20px;    
  }
}

@-webkit-keyframes ellipsis {
  to {
    width: 20px;    
  }
}

@xec's answer has more of a slide-in effect on the dots, while this allows the dots to appear instantly.