.parents()
.parents( [selector] ) Returns: jQuery
Description: Get the ancestors of each element in the current set of matched elements, optionally filtered by a selector.
-
version added: 1.0.parents( [selector] )
selectorA string containing a selector expression to match elements against.
Given a jQuery object that represents a set of DOM elements, the .parents() method allows us to search through the ancestors of these elements in the DOM tree and construct a new jQuery object from the matching elements ordered from immediate parent on up; the elements are returned in order from the closest parent to the outer ones. The .parents() and .parent() methods are similar, except that the latter only travels a single level up the DOM tree.
The method optionally accepts a selector expression of the same type that we can pass to the $() function. If the selector is supplied, the elements will be filtered by testing whether they match it.
Consider a page with a basic nested list on it:
<ul class="level-1">
<li class="item-i">I</li>
<li class="item-ii">II
<ul class="level-2">
<li class="item-a">A</li>
<li class="item-b">B
<ul class="level-3">
<li class="item-1">1</li>
<li class="item-2">2</li>
<li class="item-3">3</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="item-c">C</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="item-iii">III</li>
</ul>
If we begin at item A, we can find its ancestors:
$('li.item-a').parents().css('background-color', 'red');
The result of this call is a red background for the level-2 list, item II, and the level-1 list (and on up the DOM tree all the way to the <html> element). Since we do not supply a selector expression, all of the ancestors are part of the returned jQuery object. If we had supplied one, only the matching items among these would be included.
Examples:
Example: Find all parent elements of each b.
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<style>
b, span, p, html body {
padding: .5em;
border: 1px solid;
}
b { color:blue; }
strong { color:red; }
</style>
<script src="http://code.jquery.com/jquery-1.7rc2.js"></script>
</head>
<body>
<div>
<p>
<span>
<b>My parents are: </b>
</span>
</p>
</div>
<script>
var parentEls = $("b").parents()
.map(function () {
return this.tagName;
})
.get().join(", ");
$("b").append("<strong>" + parentEls + "</strong>");
</script>
</body>
</html>Example: Click to find all unique div parent elements of each span.
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<style>
p, div, span {margin:2px; padding:1px; }
div { border:2px white solid; }
span { cursor:pointer; font-size:12px; }
.selected { color:blue; }
b { color:red; display:block; font-size:14px; }
</style>
<script src="http://code.jquery.com/jquery-1.7rc2.js"></script>
</head>
<body>
<p>
<div>
<div><span>Hello</span></div>
<span>Hello Again</span>
</div>
<div>
<span>And Hello Again</span>
</div>
</p>
<b>Click Hellos to toggle their parents.</b>
<script>
function showParents() {
$("div").css("border-color", "white");
var len = $("span.selected")
.parents("div")
.css("border", "2px red solid")
.length;
$("b").text("Unique div parents: " + len);
}
$("span").click(function () {
$(this).toggleClass("selected");
showParents();
});</script>
</body>
</html>