Value
An Element that is the parent element of the current node,
or null if there isn't one.
Example
Using parentElement
This example sets the parent of node to have a red text color.
js
if (node.parentElement) {
node.parentElement.style.color = "red";
}
parentElement being null
parentElement can be null if the node has no parent (for example, because it isn't attached to a tree) or its parent is not an Element. On the other hand, Node.parentNode always returns the parent node, which may be a Document or other node types.
html
<!doctype html>
<html lang="en-US">
<body>
<script>
const html = document.querySelector("html");
console.log(html.parentElement); // null
console.log(html.parentNode); // document
</script>
</body>
</html>
Specifications
| Specification |
|---|
| DOM # ref-for-dom-node-parentelementâ‘ |