Element.insertAdjacentHTML()

Summary

insertAdjacentHTML() parses the specified text as HTML or XML and inserts the resulting nodes into the DOM tree at a specified position. It does not reparse the element it is being used on and thus it does not corrupt the existing elements inside the element. This, and avoiding the extra step of serialization make it much faster than direct innerHTML manipulation.

Syntax

element.insertAdjacentHTML(position, text);

position is the position relative to the element, and must be one of the following strings:

'beforebegin'

Before the element itself.

'afterbegin'

Just inside the element, before its first child.

'beforeend'

Just inside the element, after its last child.

'afterend'

After the element itself.

text is the string to be parsed as HTML or XML and inserted into the tree.

Visualization of position names

<!-- beforebegin -->
<p>
  <!-- afterbegin -->
  foo
  <!-- beforeend -->
</p>
<!-- afterend -->

Example

// <div id="one">one</div>
var d1 = document.getElementById('one');
d1.insertAdjacentHTML('afterend', '<div id="two">two</div>');

// At this point, the new structure is:
// <div id="one">one</div><div id="two">two</div>

Specification

Browser compatibility

See also

• Node.insertBefore()
• Node.appendChild() (same effect as beforeend)
• hacks.mozilla.org guest post by Henri Sivonen including benchmark showing that insertAdjacentHTML can be way faster in some cases.