What can be used to make the effect as in the photo?

Question

css

Answer 1

It's just that the padding is added up and down, and the container that contains all three cards has display: flex; align-items: center;
For the card, you write on hover adding padding-top padding-bottom and other colors and that's it

Answer 2

If you are talking about an explicit increase in the central block (for example, on hover), then:
in this case, transform: scale + z-index will help.
transform will increase the size of the active block (for example, on hover), and z-index will allow you to simulate the effect of overlapping the block on the neighboring one for the sake of beauty.