Web/API/MouseEvent/button

The MouseEvent.button read-only property indicates which button was pressed on the mouse to trigger the event.

This property only guarantees to indicate which buttons are pressed during events caused by pressing or releasing one or multiple buttons. As such, it is not reliable for events such as mouseenter, mouseleave, mouseover, mouseout or mousemove.

Users may change the configuration of buttons on their pointing device so that if an event's button property is zero, it may not have been caused by the button that is physically left–most on the pointing device; however, it should behave as if the left button was clicked in the standard button layout.

Note: Do not confuse this property with the MouseEvent.buttons property, which indicates which buttons are pressed for all mouse events types.

Syntax

var buttonPressed = instanceOfMouseEvent.button

Return value

A number representing a given button:

0: Main button pressed, usually the left button or the un-initialized state
1: Auxiliary button pressed, usually the wheel button or the middle button (if present)
2: Secondary button pressed, usually the right button
3: Fourth button, typically the Browser Back button
4: Fifth button, typically the Browser Forward button

As noted above, buttons may be configured differently to the standard "left to right" layout. A mouse configured for left-handed use may have the button actions reversed. Some pointing devices only have one button and use keyboard or other input mechanisms to indicate main, secondary, auxilary, etc. Others may have many buttons mapped to different functions and button values.

Example

HTML

<button id="button" oncontextmenu="event.preventDefault();">Click here with your mouse...</button>
<p id="log"></p>

JavaScript

let button = document.querySelector('#button');
let log = document.querySelector('#log');
button.addEventListener('mouseup', logMouseButton);

function logMouseButton(e) {
  if (typeof e === 'object') {
    switch (e.button) {
      case 0:
        log.textContent = 'Left button clicked.';
        break;
      case 1:
        log.textContent = 'Middle button clicked.';
        break;
      case 2:
        log.textContent = 'Right button clicked.';
        break;
      default:
        log.textContent = `Unknown button code: ${e.button}`;
    }
  }
}

Result

Specifications

Specification	Status	Comment
Document Object Model (DOM) Level 3 Events SpecificationThe definition of 'MouseEvent.button' in that specification.	Obsolete	Compared to Document Object Model (DOM) Level 2 Events Specification, the return value can be negative.
Document Object Model (DOM) Level 2 Events SpecificationThe definition of 'MouseEvent.button' in that specification.	Obsolete	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
`button`	Chrome Full support 1	Edge Full support 12	Firefox Full support 1	IE Full support 9	Opera Full support 10.6	Safari Full support 3.1	WebView Android Full support 1	Chrome Android Full support 18	Firefox Android Full support 4	Opera Android Full support 11	Safari iOS Full support 2	Samsung Internet Android Full support 1.0

Legend

Full support: Full support