HTMLElement: drag event

Baseline Widely available

This feature is well established and works across many devices and browser versions. It’s been available across browsers since July 2015.

The drag event is fired every few hundred milliseconds as an element or text selection is being dragged by the user.

This event is cancelable and may bubble up to the Document and Window objects.

Syntax

Use the event name in methods like addEventListener(), or set an event handler property.

js
addEventListener("drag", (event) => {});

ondrag = (event) => {};

Event type

A DragEvent. Inherits from Event.

Event UIEvent MouseEvent DragEvent

Event properties

In addition to the properties listed below, properties from the parent interface, Event, are available.

DragEvent.dataTransfer Read only

The data that is transferred during a drag and drop interaction.

Examples

Drag and drop example

HTML

html
<div class="dropzone">
  <div id="draggable" draggable="true">This div is draggable</div>
</div>
<div class="dropzone" id="drop-target"></div>

CSS

css
body {
  /* Prevent the user selecting text in the example */
  user-select: none;
}

#draggable {
  text-align: center;
  background: white;
}

.dropzone {
  width: 200px;
  height: 20px;
  background: blueviolet;
  margin: 10px;
  padding: 10px;
}

.dropzone.dragover {
  background-color: purple;
}

.dragging {
  opacity: 0.5;
}

JavaScript

js
let dragged;

/* events fired on the draggable target */
const source = document.getElementById("draggable");
source.addEventListener("drag", (event) => {
  console.log("dragging");
});

source.addEventListener("dragstart", (event) => {
  // store a ref. on the dragged elem
  dragged = event.target;
  // make it half transparent
  event.target.classList.add("dragging");
});

source.addEventListener("dragend", (event) => {
  // reset the transparency
  event.target.classList.remove("dragging");
});

/* events fired on the drop targets */
const target = document.getElementById("drop-target");
target.addEventListener(
  "dragover",
  (event) => {
    // prevent default to allow drop
    event.preventDefault();
  },
  false,
);

target.addEventListener("dragenter", (event) => {
  // highlight potential drop target when the draggable element enters it
  if (event.target.classList.contains("dropzone")) {
    event.target.classList.add("dragover");
  }
});

target.addEventListener("dragleave", (event) => {
  // reset background of potential drop target when the draggable element leaves it
  if (event.target.classList.contains("dropzone")) {
    event.target.classList.remove("dragover");
  }
});

target.addEventListener("drop", (event) => {
  // prevent default action (open as link for some elements)
  event.preventDefault();
  // move dragged element to the selected drop target
  if (event.target.classList.contains("dropzone")) {
    event.target.classList.remove("dragover");
    event.target.appendChild(dragged);
  }
});

Result

Specifications

Specification
HTML Standard
# ix-handler-ondrag
HTML Standard
# event-dnd-drag

Browser compatibility

BCD tables only load in the browser

See also