How to create Curved & Overlapping Menu Tabs in CSS

Question

I want to make a menu, in which the ends of the menus overlap and they have curved borders and slightly slanting edges.

Without using a background image, is it possi

Answer 1

I think I've solved It.

DEMO

Here is What I've added to The Code given at: http://css-tricks.com/tabs-with-round-out-borders/

I've Just added, background-color property to pseudo element :before and :after of .active li's css.

As follows:

.tabs li { 
  /* Makes a horizontal row */
  float: left; 

  /* So the psueudo elements can be
     abs. positioned inside */
  position: relative; 
  /*Make Sure The Li's stays Inline */
   display:inline-block;
  /* Remove Ugly Chromes `.` */
   list-styling:none;
}
.tabs .active a { 
  /* Colors when tab is active */
  background: #aea; /* Added Green Color */ 
  color: black; 
}
.tabs li:last-child:after,   .tabs li:last-child a:after,
.tabs li:first-child:before, .tabs li:first-child a:before,
.tabs .active:after,   .tabs .active:before, 
.tabs .active a:after, .tabs .active a:before {
    content: "";
    background: #afa; 
  }
.tabs .active:before, .tabs .active:after {
  background: white; 
  background:#afa;  
  /* Squares below circles */
  z-index: 1;
}
.tabs .active a:after, .tabs .active a:before {
  background: #ddc385;
}

and here is another fiddle after adding some JQuery to make it live. Hope it helps :).

Answer 2

• Skew the :before and :after pseudo elements,
• set pseudos to some - offset
• add left-top border-radius to :before and right-top to :after
• if needed (to remove the top hard edge) add top border radius to the A element
• add z-index:1; to the :after
• add z-index:1; to the .active's :before element.

nav li {
  display: inline-block;
  border-bottom: 1px solid #8BBF50;
  margin-left: -20px;
}

nav a {
  text-decoration: none;
  color: #fff;
  background: #8BBF50;
  position: relative;
  display: inline-block;
  margin: 0 22px;
  padding: 8px 11px;
  text-shadow: 0 1px 0 rgba(0, 2, 0, 0.4);
  border-radius: 7px 7px 0 0; /* just to smooth the top edges */
}

nav a:before,
nav a:after {
  content: " ";
  position: absolute;
  top: 0;
  width: 23px;
  height: 100%;
  background-color: inherit;
}

nav a:before {
  border-radius: 12px 0 0 0;
  transform: skew(-24deg);
  left: -13px; /* play with this one to give the LI border ~2px extrusion */
}

nav a:after {
  border-radius: 0 12px 0 0;
  transform: skew(24deg);
  right: -13px; /* play with this one to give the LI border ~2px extrusion */
  border-right: 1px solid #628E2F;
  z-index: 1; /* overlap next element */
}


/* LI ACTIVE  */

nav li.active {
  border-bottom: 1px solid #fff;
}

nav li.active a {
  color: #8BBF50;
  background: #fff;
}

nav li.active a:before {
  z-index: 1; /* overlap prev element */
}

nav li.active a:after {
  border-bottom: 1px solid #fff;
}

<nav>
  <ul>
    <li><a>Home</a></li>
    <li class="active"><a>About</a></li>
    <li><a>Products</a></li>
    <li><a>Map</a></li>
    <li><a>Contact</a></li>
  </ul>
</nav>

The above does not provide the concave curvature at the bottom of the tab, instead I used the LI element border-bottom 2px extrusion to give a slight feeling to the eye. Not perfect but still a nice solution.

live demo on jsBin