Web/API/Node/contains

The Node.contains() method returns a Boolean value indicating whether a node is a descendant of a given node, i.e. the node itself, one of its direct children (childNodes), one of the children's direct children, and so on.

Syntax

node.contains( otherNode )

Example

This function checks to see if an element is in the page's body. As contains is inclusive and determining if the body contains itself isn't the intention of isInPage this case explicitly returns false.

function isInPage(node) {
  return (node === document.body) ? false : document.body.contains(node);
}

Specifications

Specification	Status	Comment
DOMThe definition of 'Node.contains()' 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
`contains`	Chrome Full support 16	Edge Full support 12	Firefox Full support 9	IE Partial support 9 Notes' Partial support 9 Notes' Notes' Only supported for `HTMLElement`, not all `Node` objects.	Opera Full support 7	Safari Full support 1.1	WebView Android Full support ≤37	Chrome Android Full support 18	Firefox Android Full support 9	Opera Android Full support 10.1	Safari iOS Full support 1	Samsung Internet Android Full support 1.0

Legend

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