onclick event

Article
01/24/2012

[This documentation is preliminary and is subject to change.]

Fires when the user clicks the left mouse button on the object.

Syntax

HTML Attribute	<element onclick = "handler(event)">
Event Property	object.onclick = handler;
attachEvent Method	object.attachEvent("onclick", handler)
addEventListener Method	object.addEventListener("click", handler, useCapture)

Standards information

HTML 4.01 Specification, Section 18.2.3

Event information

Synchronous	No
Bubbles	No
Cancelable	No

Event handler parameters

pEvtObj [in]
Type: IHTMLEventObj

Remarks

If the user clicks the left mouse button, the onclick event for an object occurs only if the mouse pointer is over the object and an onmousedown and an onmouseup event occur in that order. For example, if the user clicks the mouse on the object but moves the mouse pointer away from the object before releasing, no onclick event occurs.

The onclick event changes the value of a control in a group. This change initiates the event for the group, not for the individual control. For example, if the user clicks a radio button or check box in a group, the onclick event occurs after the onbeforeupdate and onafterupdate events for the control group.

If the user clicks an object that can receive the input focus but does not already have the focus, the onfocus event occurs for that object before the onclick event. If the user double-clicks the left mouse button in a control, an ondblclick event occurs immediately after the onclick event.

Although the onclick event is available on a large number of HTML elements, if a document is to be accessible to keyboard users, you should restrict its use to the a, input, area, and button elements. These elements automatically allow keyboard access through the TAB key, making documents that use the elements accessible to keyboard users. For more information, please see the section on writing accessible Dynamic HTML.

Initiates any action associated with the object. For example, if the user clicks an a object, the client loads the document specified by the href property. To cancel the default behavior, set the returnValue property of the event object to FALSE.

To invoke this event, do one of the following:

Click the object.
Invoke the click method.
Press the ENTER key in a form.
Press the access key for a control.
Select an item in a combo box or list box by clicking the left mouse button or by pressing the arrow keys and then pressing the ENTER key.

The pEvtObj parameter is required for the following interfaces:

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