Storage.getItem()

The getItem() method of the Storage interface, when passed a key name, will return that key's value.

Syntax

var aValue = storage.getItem(keyName);

Parameters

keyName: A DOMString containing the name of the key you want to retrieve the value of.

Returns

A DOMString containing the value of the key. If the key does not exist, null is returned.

Example

The following function retrieves three data items from local storage, then uses them to set custom styles on a page.

function setStyles() {
  var currentColor = localStorage.getItem('bgcolor');
  var currentFont = localStorage.getItem('font');
  var currentImage = localStorage.getItem('image');

  document.getElementById('bgcolor').value = currentColor;
  document.getElementById('font').value = currentFont;
  document.getElementById('image').value = currentImage;

  htmlElem.style.backgroundColor = '#' + currentColor;
  pElem.style.fontFamily = currentFont;
  imgElem.setAttribute('src', currentImage);
}

Note: To see this used within a real world example, see our Web Storage Demo.

Specifications

Specification	Status	Comment
Web Storage (Second edition) The definition of 'getItem()' in that specification.	Recommendation

Feature	Chrome	Firefox (Gecko)	Internet Explorer	Opera	Safari (WebKit)
localStorage	4	3.5	8	10.50	4
sessionStorage	5	2	8	10.50	4

Feature	Android	Firefox Mobile (Gecko)	IE Phone	Opera Mobile	Safari Mobile
Basic support	2.1	?	8	11	iOS 3.2

All browsers have varying capacity levels for both localStorage and sessionStorage. Here is a detailed rundown of all the storage capacities for various browsers.

Note: since iOS 5.1, Safari Mobile stores localStorage data in the cache folder, which is subject to occasional clean up, at the behest of the OS, typically if space is short.