HTMLAnchorElement: href property

The href property of the HTMLAnchorElement interface is a stringifier that returns the absolute URL corresponding to the element's href attribute (or an empty string if href is unset). Setting this property updates the element's href attribute to the provided value.

Value

A string.

Examples

A freshly created <a> element has no href attribute, so its href property returns an empty string.

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const anchor = document.createElement("a");
console.log(anchor.href); // ""

If the attribute is set to an empty string, the property returns the document's base URL because the empty string is a valid relative URL.

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anchor.href = "";
console.log(anchor.href); // "https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/HTMLAnchorElement/href"

If the attribute is set to a relative URL, the property returns the absolute URL resolved against the document's base URL.

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anchor.href = "../../..";
console.log(anchor.href); // "https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/"

Note that the attribute's value remains as set, without resolution.

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console.log(anchor.getAttribute("href")); // "../../.."

If the attribute is set to an absolute URL, the property returns that absolute URL as-is.

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anchor.href = "https://example.com/path";
console.log(anchor.href); // "https://example.com/path"

If the attribute is set to an invalid URL, the property returns the attribute's value as-is.

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anchor.href = "https://";
console.log(anchor.href); // "https://"

Specifications

See also