How many CSS Files can be used in responsive design

off.the.walls

One thing i've noticed is that any tutorials or anything on responsive design only cover up to 3 css sheets.

Can you use more or is 3 the max that can be used?

sheesh

Nope as many or as few as you like but if it's a busy site you will take a hit on the server sending extra files.

Some people suggest that you have all the functional areas separate on your test server so you can edit and change them safely but when you are putting it into the live site you stick the css into one big file and use some automated process to get rid of all the whitespace within that file. so you will have 1 css, 1 js, 1 html and images to send to the user.

uglybunz

You need to be careful with IE, versions < 10 - they can't handle more than 31 stylesheets and can't cope with more than 4096 selectors in one stylesheet. That's a whole lot of styles, but use a complex CMS sitting on top of a few frameworks and js libraries and you can cross these limits surprisingly easily.

mrbubbles

Why would you want to use lots of stylesheets? Ideally once you have finished building the site you should be using a pre-processor (LESS/SCSS/SASS) to compile them all into a single stylesheet to reduce the amount of HTTP requests your site is making. Something like Codekit on Mac can automate this process for you...

Manc Red

Two CSS files is more than sufficient for most websites. Three is about the max any website would need and should only ever be used on very complex sites.