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 onclick="selectText()">Select text</button>

JavaScript

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

Result

Notes

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

In browsers where it is not supported, it is possible to replace it with a call to HTMLInputElement.setSelectionRange() with parameters 0 and the input's value length:

html
<input onClick="this.select();" value="Sample Text" />
<!-- equivalent to -->
<input
  onClick="this.setSelectionRange(0, this.value.length);"
  value="Sample Text" />

Specifications

Specification
HTML
# dom-textarea/input-select

Browser compatibility

Report problems with this compatibility data on GitHub
desktopmobile
Chrome
Edge
Firefox
Opera
Safari
Chrome Android
Firefox for Android
Opera Android
Safari on iOS
Samsung Internet
WebView Android
WebView on iOS
select

Legend

Tip: you can click/tap on a cell for more information.

Full support
Full support

See also