SP Page Builder – Article Add-on (Masonry): Disable Click / Navigation Completely
Andreas Lauschke
Hello JoomShaper Support Team,
I am using Joomla 6 with Helix Ultimate and SP Page Builder.
For a guestbook, I am using the Article Add-on in Masonry layout to display multiple Joomla articles together. These articles are intended purely for presentation (image + text). Opening the article detail page does not provide any additional content or value.
The issue: In the Masonry layout, the articles are always clickable, regardless of CSS or JavaScript attempts to disable this behavior. Even when:
all <a> elements are disabled via CSS,
pointer-events: none is applied to all relevant containers,
click events are intercepted via JavaScript (preventDefault, stopPropagation, capture phase, etc.),
clicking an article still triggers navigation to the article detail page.
This behavior does not seem to be controlled by standard DOM events or CSS hover states, but rather by an internal JavaScript mechanism of the Article Add-on itself.
My questions:
Is there an official way to completely disable navigation in the Article Add-on (especially in Masonry layout), e.g. a “read-only” or “static” mode?
If not, is such an option planned or intended?
Alternatively, is there a recommended way to output the article title and image without making them clickable?
I would appreciate a brief technical clarification or recommendation.
Kind regards, Andreas Lauschke
Andreas Lauschke
Accepted AnswerUpdate / Solution (for anyone with the same issue):
After further testing, the issue was not CSS specificity in general, but the fact that the Article Add-on (Masonry layout) wraps both the intro image and the title in <a> tags that remain clickable regardless of most CSS/JS attempts.
What does work reliably is disabling pointer events directly on the anchor elements, scoped by the specific add-on ID.
/* Disable click on intro image */
#sppb-addon-7dac31cb-64da-4aa5-9baf-02ffc14747a1
.sppb-article-img-wrap {
pointer-events: none;
cursor: default;
}
/* Disable click on article title */
#sppb-addon-7dac31cb-64da-4aa5-9baf-02ffc14747a1
.sppb-article-info-wrap h3 a {
pointer-events: none;
cursor: default;
text-decoration: none;
}
This makes the Article Add-on effectively read-only / static:
image is no longer clickable
title is no longer clickable
layout and content remain unchanged
Maybe this helps others who want to use the Article Add-on as a presentation element rather than a link to the article detail page.
