jQuery API

jQuery is a fast, small, and feature-rich JavaScript library. It makes things like HTML document traversal and manipulation, event handling, animation, and Ajax much simpler with an easy-to-use API that works across a multitude of browsers. If you're new to jQuery, we recommend that you check out the jQuery Learning Center.

If you're updating to a newer version of jQuery, be sure to read the release notes published on our blog. If you're coming from a version prior 1.9, you should check out the 1.9 Upgrade Guide as well.

Note that this is the API documentation for jQuery core. Other projects have API docs in other locations:


callbacks.has()

Determine whether or not the list has any callbacks attached. If a callback is provided as an argument, determine whether it is in a list.

.closest()

For each element in the set, get the first element that matches the selector by testing the element itself and traversing up through its ancestors in the DOM tree.

.css()

Get the value of a computed style property for the first element in the set of matched elements or set one or more CSS properties for every matched element.

.data()

Store arbitrary data associated with the matched elements or return the value at the named data store for the first element in the set of matched elements.

.find()

Get the descendants of each element in the current set of matched elements, filtered by a selector, jQuery object, or element.

.finish()

Stop the currently-running animation, remove all queued animations, and complete all animations for the matched elements.

.has()

Reduce the set of matched elements to those that have a descendant that matches the selector or DOM element.

.hover()

Bind one or two handlers to the matched elements, to be executed when the mouse pointer enters and leaves the elements.

.is()

Check the current matched set of elements against a selector, element, or jQuery object and return true if at least one of these elements matches the given arguments.

jQuery()

Return a collection of matched elements either found in the DOM based on passed argument(s) or created by passing an HTML string.

jQuery.cssHooks

Hook directly into jQuery to override how particular CSS properties are retrieved or set, normalize CSS property naming, or create custom properties.

jQuery.Deferred()

A factory function that returns a chainable utility object with methods to register multiple callbacks into callback queues, invoke callback queues, and relay the success or failure state of any synchronous or asynchronous function.

jQuery.each()

A generic iterator function, which can be used to seamlessly iterate over both objects and arrays. Arrays and array-like objects with a length property (such as a function’s arguments object) are iterated by numeric index, from 0 to length-1. Other objects are iterated via their named properties.

jQuery.grep()

Finds the elements of an array which satisfy a filter function. The original array is not affected.

jQuery.speed

Creates an object containing a set of properties ready to be used in the definition of custom animations.

jQuery.support

A collection of properties that represent the presence of different browser features or bugs. Intended for jQuery’s internal use; specific properties may be removed when they are no longer needed internally to improve page startup performance. For your own project’s feature-detection needs, we strongly recommend the use of an external library such as Modernizr instead of dependency on properties in jQuery.support.

jQuery.unique()

Sorts an array of DOM elements, in place, with the duplicates removed. Note that this only works on arrays of DOM elements, not strings or numbers.

jQuery.uniqueSort()

Sorts an array of DOM elements, in place, with the duplicates removed. Note that this only works on arrays of DOM elements, not strings or numbers.

jQuery.when()

Provides a way to execute callback functions based on zero or more objects, usually Deferred objects that represent asynchronous events.

.map()

Pass each element in the current matched set through a function, producing a new jQuery object containing the return values.

.next()

Get the immediately following sibling of each element in the set of matched elements. If a selector is provided, it retrieves the next sibling only if it matches that selector.

.nextUntil()

Get all following siblings of each element up to but not including the element matched by the selector, DOM node, or jQuery object passed.

.outerHeight()

Get the current computed height for the first element in the set of matched elements, including padding, border, and optionally margin. Returns a number (without “px”) representation of the value or null if called on an empty set of elements.

.parentsUntil()

Get the ancestors of each element in the current set of matched elements, up to but not including the element matched by the selector, DOM node, or jQuery object.

.prev()

Get the immediately preceding sibling of each element in the set of matched elements. If a selector is provided, it retrieves the previous sibling only if it matches that selector.

.promise()

Return a Promise object to observe when all actions of a certain type bound to the collection, queued or not, have finished.

.text()

Get the combined text contents of each element in the set of matched elements, including their descendants, or set the text contents of the matched elements.