[Chapter 21] Reference: Element.click()
Author: David Flanagan
Date: Fri Aug 29 11:15:28 1997

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| Chapter 21 JavaScript Reference |

# Element.click() Method

## Name

Element.click() Method---simulate a mouse click on a form element

## Availability

Navigator 2.0, Internet Explorer 3.0

## Synopsis

    element.click()

### Arguments

none

### Returns

nothing

## Description

The `click()` method of a form element simulates a mouse click on the form element, but does not invoke the `onclick()` event handler of the element.

The `click()` method is not often useful. Because it does not invoke the `onClick()` event handler, it is not useful to call this method on Button elements--they don't have any behavior other than that defined by the `onClick()` handler. Calling `click()` on a Submit or Reset element will submit or reset a form, but this can be more directly achieved with the `submit()` and `reset()` method of the Form object itself.

You can call `click()` on Radio and Checkbox elements to check or uncheck those buttons, but it is generally easier to simply set the `checked` property of those elements. Furthermore, `click()` does not work for these elements in Navigator 2.0 or 3.0 on Unix platforms.

On Windows (but not Unix) platforms, you can even call `click()` for Select elements, but doing so does not accomplish much. For Select objects implemented as drop-down menus, for example `click()` will cause the menu to drop down, but does not actually select an item from the menu. It is poor user-interface design to do this sort of thing--the user should always be in control of the form elements.

Finally, the `click()` method is not defined for the text input form elements: Text, Textarea, Password and FileUpload.

## See Also

"Element"

Element.checked |  | Element.defaultChecked