Web/API/Element/localName

The Element.localName read-only property returns the local part of the qualified name of an element.

In previous DOM specifications this API was defined within the Node interface.

Syntax

name = element.localName

Return value

A DOMString representing the local part of the element's qualified name.

Example

(Must be served with XML content type, such as text/xml or application/xhtml+xml.)

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"
      xmlns:svg="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">
<head>
  <script type="application/javascript"><![CDATA[
  function test() {
    var text = document.getElementById('text');
    var circle = document.getElementById('circle');
    
    text.value = "<svg:circle> has:\n" +
                 "localName = '" + circle.localName + "'\n" +
                 "namespaceURI = '" + circle.namespaceURI + "'";
  }
  ]]></script>
</head>
<body onload="test()">
  <svg:svg version="1.1"
    width="100px" height="100px"
    viewBox="0 0 100 100">
    <svg:circle cx="50" cy="50" r="30" style="fill:#aaa" id="circle"/>
  </svg:svg>
  <textarea id="text" rows="4" cols="55"/>
</body>
</html>

Notes

The local name of a node is that part of the node's qualified name that comes after the colon. Qualified names are typically used in XML as part of the namespace(s) of the particular XML documents. For example, in the qualified name ecomm:partners, partners is the local name and ecomm is the prefix:

<ecomm:business id="soda_shop" type="brick_n_mortar" xmlns:ecomm="http://example.com/ecomm">
  <ecomm:partners>
    <ecomm:partner id="1001">Tony's Syrup Warehouse
    </ecomm:partner>
  </ecomm:partner>
</ecomm:business>

Note: In Gecko 1.9.2 and earlier, the property returns the upper-cased version of the local name for HTML elements in HTML DOMs (as opposed to XHTML elements in XML DOMs). In later versions, in compliance with HTML5, the property returns in the case of the internal DOM storage, which is lower case for both HTML elements in HTML DOMs and XHTML elements in XML DOMs. The tagName property continues to return in the upper case for HTML elements in HTML DOMs.

Specifications

Specification	Status	Comment
DOMThe definition of 'Element.localName' in that specification.	Living Standard	Initial definition

Browser compatibility

Update compatibility data on GitHub

	Desktop						Mobile
	Chrome	Edge	Firefox	Internet Explorer	Opera	Safari	Android webview	Chrome for Android	Firefox for Android	Opera for Android	Safari on iOS	Samsung Internet
`localName`	Chrome Full support 31 Notes' Full support 31 Notes' Notes' This API was previously available on the `Node` API.	Edge Full support 17	Firefox Full support 48 Notes' Full support 48 Notes' Notes' This API was previously available on the `Node` API.	IE Full support 9	Opera Full support Yes	Safari Full support 10	WebView Android Full support Yes Notes' Full support Yes Notes' Notes' This API was previously available on the `Node` API.	Chrome Android Full support 31 Notes' Full support 31 Notes' Notes' This API was previously available on the `Node` API.	Firefox Android Full support 48 Notes' Full support 48 Notes' Notes' This API was previously available on the `Node` API.	Opera Android Full support Yes	Safari iOS Full support Yes	Samsung Internet Android Full support 2.0 Notes' Full support 2.0 Notes' Notes' This API was previously available on the `Node` API.

Legend

Full support: Full support
See implementation notes.': See implementation notes.