Child Selector (“parent > child”)

Categories: Selectors > Hierarchy

child selector

Description: Selects all direct child elements specified by "child" of elements specified by "parent".

  • version added: 1.0jQuery( "parent > child" )

    parent: Any valid selector.

    child: A selector to filter the child elements.

As a CSS selector, the child combinator is supported by all modern web browsers including Safari, Firefox, Opera, Chrome, and Internet Explorer 7 and above, but notably not by Internet Explorer versions 6 and below. However, in jQuery, this selector (along with all others) works across all supported browsers, including IE6.

The child combinator (E > F) can be thought of as a more specific form of the descendant combinator (E F) in that it selects only first-level descendants.

Example:

Places a border around all list items that are children of <ul class="topnav"> .

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<!doctype html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
  <meta charset="utf-8">
  <title>child demo</title>
  <style>
  body {
    font-size: 14px;
  }
  	</style>
  <script src="jquery-1.10.2.js"></script>
</head>
<body>
 
<ul class="topnav">
  <li>Item 1</li>
  <li>Item 2
    <ul>
    <li>Nested item 1</li>
    <li>Nested item 2</li>
    <li>Nested item 3</li>
    </ul>
  </li>
  <li>Item 3</li>
</ul>
 
<script>
$( "ul.topnav > li" ).css( "border", "3px double red" );
</script>
 
</body>
</html>

Demo: