Detect click outside React component

Question

I\'m looking for a way to detect if a click event happened outside of a component, as described in this article. jQuery closest() is used to see if the target from a click e

Answer 1

Refs usage in React 16.3+ changed.

The following solution uses ES6 and follows best practices for binding as well as setting the ref through a method.

To see it in action:

• Class Implementation
• Hooks Implementation

Class Implementation:

import React, { Component } from 'react';
import PropTypes from 'prop-types';

/**
 * Component that alerts if you click outside of it
 */
export default class OutsideAlerter extends Component {
    constructor(props) {
        super(props);

        this.wrapperRef = React.createRef();
        this.setWrapperRef = this.setWrapperRef.bind(this);
        this.handleClickOutside = this.handleClickOutside.bind(this);
    }

    componentDidMount() {
        document.addEventListener('mousedown', this.handleClickOutside);
    }

    componentWillUnmount() {
        document.removeEventListener('mousedown', this.handleClickOutside);
    }

    /**
     * Alert if clicked on outside of element
     */
    handleClickOutside(event) {
        if (this.wrapperRef && !this.wrapperRef.current.contains(event.target)) {
            alert('You clicked outside of me!');
        }
    }

    render() {
        return 
{this.props.children}
;
    }
}

OutsideAlerter.propTypes = {
    children: PropTypes.element.isRequired,
};

Hooks Implementation:

import React, { useRef, useEffect } from "react";

/**
 * Hook that alerts clicks outside of the passed ref
 */
function useOutsideAlerter(ref) {
    useEffect(() => {
        /**
         * Alert if clicked on outside of element
         */
        function handleClickOutside(event) {
            if (ref.current && !ref.current.contains(event.target)) {
                alert("You clicked outside of me!");
            }
        }

        // Bind the event listener
        document.addEventListener("mousedown", handleClickOutside);
        return () => {
            // Unbind the event listener on clean up
            document.removeEventListener("mousedown", handleClickOutside);
        };
    }, [ref]);
}

/**
 * Component that alerts if you click outside of it
 */
export default function OutsideAlerter(props) {
    const wrapperRef = useRef(null);
    useOutsideAlerter(wrapperRef);

    return 
{props.children}
;
}