Descendant Selector (“ancestor descendant”)

Categories: Selectors > Hierarchy

descendant selector

version added: 1.0jQuery('ancestor descendant')

  • ancestor
    Any valid selector.
    descendant
    A selector to filter the descendant elements.

Description: Selects all elements that are descendants of a given ancestor.

A descendant of an element could be a child, grandchild, great-grandchild, and so on, of that element.

Example:

Finds all input descendants of forms.

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
  <style>

  body { font-size:14px; }
  form { border:2px green solid; padding:2px; margin:0;
         background:#efe; }
  div { color:red; }
  fieldset { margin:1px; padding:3px; }
  </style>
  <script src="https://code.jquery.com/jquery-latest.js"></script>
</head>
<body>
	<form>
    <div>Form is surrounded by the green outline</div>
    <label>Child:</label>
    <input name="name" />

    <fieldset>
      <label>Grandchild:</label>
      <input name="newsletter" />
    </fieldset>

  </form>
  Sibling to form: <input name="none" />
<script>$("form input").css("border", "2px dotted blue");</script>
</body>
</html>

Demo: