Width of minipage inside center environment

So I have three columns of content next to each other, using the minipage syntax, with the width specified in \textwidth, all of this placed in a center environment. Weirdly enough, if I make widths of the columns add up to the full size of \textwidth, it does not fit on the page. After some testing, the inner width of center appears to be only around 98.57% of \textwidth. E.g. the following does not fit, and the C block is put on the next line:

\begin{center}
\begin{minipage}{0.10\textwidth}
A
\end{minipage}
\begin{minipage}{0.10\textwidth}
B
\end{minipage}
\begin{minipage}{0.7858\textwidth}
C
\end{minipage}
\end{center}


So how does one specify the width of the page within a center environment, or how does one center some blocks that together have between 98.56% and 100% of the width of the page?

Also, I realise that it does not make much sense to center content that is exactly as wide as the page itself, so this is more a question out of curiosity than that I'm searching for a solution to some problem.

• Welcome to TeX.SX! There is a space after each \end{minipage}. Type \end{minipage}% instead and the last can be 0.8\textwidth. – egreg Mar 1 '18 at 23:25

to sum of table width you need to add spaces between mini tables or remove this spaces. in the second case you will obtain:

(red lines indicate text area borders)

\documentclass{article}

%-------------------------------- show page layout, only for test
\usepackage{showframe}
\renewcommand\ShowFrameLinethickness{0.15pt}
\renewcommand*\ShowFrameColor{\color{red}}
%---------------------------------------------------------------%

\begin{document}
\begin{center}
\begin{minipage}{0.10\textwidth}
A