HTMLAnchorElement: href property

Value

A string.

• If the href attribute is absent, the value is an empty string ("").
• If the href attribute is present but is not a valid relative or absolute URL, the value is the attribute's value as-is.
• If the href attribute is present and is a valid relative or absolute URL, the value is the absolute URL, resolved relative to the document's base URL. The empty string ("") is considered a valid relative URL, resolving to the document's base URL.

Examples

A freshly created <a> element has no href attribute, so its href property returns an empty string.

const anchor = document.createElement("a");
console.log(anchor.href); // ""

If the attribute is set to an empty string, the property returns the document's base URL because the empty string is a valid relative URL.

anchor.href = "";
console.log(anchor.href); // "https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/HTMLAnchorElement/href"

If the attribute is set to a relative URL, the property returns the absolute URL resolved against the document's base URL.

anchor.href = "../../..";
console.log(anchor.href); // "https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/"

Note that the attribute's value remains as set, without resolution.

console.log(anchor.getAttribute("href")); // "../../.."

If the attribute is set to an absolute URL, the property returns that absolute URL as-is.

anchor.href = "https://example.com/path";
console.log(anchor.href); // "https://example.com/path"

If the attribute is set to an invalid URL, the property returns the attribute's value as-is.

anchor.href = "https://";
console.log(anchor.href); // "https://"

Specifications

Browser compatibility

See also

• The HTMLAnchorElement interface it belongs to.