HTMLInputElement: select() method

Baseline Widely available

This feature is well established and works across many devices and browser versions. It’s been available across browsers since July 2015.

The HTMLInputElement.select() method selects all the text in a <textarea> element or in an <input> element that includes a text field.

Syntax

js
select()

Parameters

None.

Return value

None (undefined).

Examples

Click the button in this example to select all the text in the <input> element.

HTML

html
<input type="text" id="text-box" size="20" value="Hello world!" />
<button>Select text</button>

JavaScript

js
function selectText() {
  const input = document.getElementById("text-box");
  input.focus();
  input.select();
}

document.querySelector("button").addEventListener("click", selectText);

Result

Notes

Calling element.select() will not necessarily focus the input, so it is often used with HTMLElement.focus.

Specifications

Specification
HTML
# dom-textarea/input-select

Browser compatibility

See also