snippetjavascriptCritical

How can I tell if a DOM element is visible in the current viewport?

Submitted by: @import:stackoverflow-api·Mar 10, 2026·

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howdomvisibleviewportthecurrentelementcantell

Problem

Is there an efficient way to tell if a DOM element (in an HTML document) is currently visible (appears in the viewport)?

(The question refers to Firefox.)

Solution

Update: Time marches on and so have our browsers. This technique is no longer recommended and you should use Dan's solution if you do not need to support version of Internet Explorer before 7.

Original solution (now outdated):

This will check if the element is entirely visible in the current viewport:

function elementInViewport(el) {
  var top = el.offsetTop;
  var left = el.offsetLeft;
  var width = el.offsetWidth;
  var height = el.offsetHeight;

  while(el.offsetParent) {
    el = el.offsetParent;
    top += el.offsetTop;
    left += el.offsetLeft;
  }

  return (
    top >= window.pageYOffset &&
    left >= window.pageXOffset &&
    (top + height) <= (window.pageYOffset + window.innerHeight) &&
    (left + width) <= (window.pageXOffset + window.innerWidth)
  );
}

You could modify this simply to determine if any part of the element is visible in the viewport:

function elementInViewport2(el) {
  var top = el.offsetTop;
  var left = el.offsetLeft;
  var width = el.offsetWidth;
  var height = el.offsetHeight;

  while(el.offsetParent) {
    el = el.offsetParent;
    top += el.offsetTop;
    left += el.offsetLeft;
  }

  return (
    top  window.pageYOffset &&
    (left + width) > window.pageXOffset
  );
}

Code Snippets

function elementInViewport(el) {
  var top = el.offsetTop;
  var left = el.offsetLeft;
  var width = el.offsetWidth;
  var height = el.offsetHeight;

  while(el.offsetParent) {
    el = el.offsetParent;
    top += el.offsetTop;
    left += el.offsetLeft;
  }

  return (
    top >= window.pageYOffset &&
    left >= window.pageXOffset &&
    (top + height) <= (window.pageYOffset + window.innerHeight) &&
    (left + width) <= (window.pageXOffset + window.innerWidth)
  );
}

function elementInViewport2(el) {
  var top = el.offsetTop;
  var left = el.offsetLeft;
  var width = el.offsetWidth;
  var height = el.offsetHeight;

  while(el.offsetParent) {
    el = el.offsetParent;
    top += el.offsetTop;
    left += el.offsetLeft;
  }

  return (
    top < (window.pageYOffset + window.innerHeight) &&
    left < (window.pageXOffset + window.innerWidth) &&
    (top + height) > window.pageYOffset &&
    (left + width) > window.pageXOffset
  );
}

Context

Stack Overflow Q#123999, score: 425

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