I want to vertical-align text in select box

I stumbled across this set of css properties which seem to vertically align the text in sized select elements in Firefox:

select
{
    box-sizing: content-box;
    -moz-box-sizing:content-box;
    -webkit-box-sizing:content-box;
}

If anything, though, it pushes the text down even farther in IE8. If I set the box-sizing property back to border-box, it at least doesn't make IE8 any worse (and FF still applies the -moz-box-sizing property). It would be nice to find a solution for IE, but I'm not holding my breath.

Edit: Nix this. It doesn't work after testing. For anyone interested, though, the problem seems to stem from built-in styles in FF's forms.css file affecting input and select elements. The property in question is line-height:normal !important. It cannot be overridden. I've tried. I discovered that if I delete the built-in property in Firebug I get a select element with reasonably vertically-centered text.

Your best option will probably be to adjust the top padding & compare across browsers. It's not perfect, but I think it's as close as you can get.

padding-top:4px;

The amount of padding you need will depend on the font size.

Tip: If your font is set in px, set padding in px as well. If your font is set in em, set the padding in em too.

EDIT

These are the options I think you have, since vertical-align isn't consistant across the browsers.

A. Remove height attribute and let the browser handle it. This usually works the best for me.

 <style>
    select{
        border: 1px solid #ABADB3;
        margin: 0;
        padding: auto 0;
        font-size:14px;
    }
    </style>
    <select>
        <option>option 1</option>
        <option>number 2</option>
    </select>

---

B. Add top-padding to push down the text. (Pushed down the arrow in some browsers)

<style>
select{
    height: 28px !important;
    border: 1px solid #ABADB3;
    margin: 0;
    padding: 4px 0 0 0;
    font-size:14px;
}
</style>
<select>
    <option>option 1</option>
    <option>number 2</option>
</select>

---

C. You can make the font larger to try and match the select height a little nicer.

<style>
select{
    height: 28px !important;
    border: 1px solid #ABADB3;
    margin: 0;
    padding: 0 0 0 0;
    font-size:17px;
}
</style>
<select>
    <option>option 1</option>
    <option>number 2</option>
</select>