Event.eventPhase

The eventPhase read-only property of the Event interface indicates which phase of the event flow is currently being evaluated.

Syntax

var phase = event.eventPhase;

Value

Returns an integer value which specifies the current evaluation phase of the event flow; possible values are listed in Event phase constants.

Constants

Event phase constants

These values describe which phase the event flow is currently being evaluated.

For more details, see section 3.1, Event dispatch and DOM event flow, of the DOM Level 3 Events specification.

Example

HTML

<h4>Event Propagation Chain</h4>
<ul>
  <li>Click 'd1'</li>
  <li>Analyse event propagation chain</li>
  <li>Click next div and repeat the experience</li>
  <li>Change Capturing mode</li>
  <li>Repeat the experience</li>
</ul>
<input type="checkbox" id="chCapture" />
<label for="chCapture">Use Capturing</label>
  <div id="d1">d1
    <div id="d2">d2
      <div id="d3">d3
        <div id="d4">d4</div>
      </div>
    </div>
  </div>
<div id="divInfo"></div> 

CSS

div { 
  margin: 20px;
  padding: 4px;
  border: thin black solid;
} 

#divInfo { 
  margin: 18px;
  padding: 8px;
  background-color:white;
  font-size:80%; 
}

JavaScript

var clear = false, divInfo = null, divs = null, useCapture = false;
window.onload = function () {
  divInfo = document.getElementById('divInfo');
  divs = document.getElementsByTagName('div');
  chCapture = document.getElementById('chCapture');
  chCapture.onclick = function () {
    RemoveListeners();
    AddListeners();
  }
  Clear();
  AddListeners();
}

function RemoveListeners() {
  for (var i = 0; i < divs.length; i++) {
    var d = divs[i];
    if (d.id != "divInfo") {
      d.removeEventListener("click", OnDivClick, true);
      d.removeEventListener("click", OnDivClick, false);
    }
  }
}

function AddListeners() {
  for (var i = 0; i < divs.length; i++) {
    var d = divs[i];
    if (d.id != "divInfo") {
      if (chCapture.checked)
        d.addEventListener("click", OnDivClick, true);
      else
        d.addEventListener("click", OnDivClick, false);
      d.onmousemove = function () { clear = true; };
    }
  }
} 

function OnDivClick(e) {
  if (clear) {
    Clear(); clear = false;
  }
  if (e.eventPhase == 2)
    e.currentTarget.style.backgroundColor = 'red';
  var level = e.eventPhase == 0 ? "none" : e.eventPhase == 1 ? "capturing" : e.eventPhase == 2 ? "target" : e.eventPhase == 3 ? "bubbling" : "error";
  divInfo.innerHTML += e.currentTarget.id + "; eventPhase: " + level + "<br/>";
}

function Clear() {
  for (var i = 0; i < divs.length; i++) {
    if (divs[i].id != "divInfo")
      divs[i].style.backgroundColor = (i & 1) ? "#f6eedb" : "#cceeff";
  }
  divInfo.innerHTML = '';
}

Result

Specifications

Browser compatibility