Remove all child elements of a DOM node in JavaScript

Question

How would I go about removing all of the child elements of a DOM node in JavaScript?

Say I have the following (ugly) HTML:

    &         


        

Answer 1

The fastest...

var removeChilds = function (node) {
    var last;
    while (last = node.lastChild) node.removeChild(last);
};

Thanks to Andrey Lushnikov for his link to jsperf.com (cool site!).

EDIT: to be clear, there is no performance difference in Chrome between firstChild and lastChild. The top answer shows a good solution for performance.

Answer 2

There are couple of options to achieve that:

The fastest ():

while (node.lastChild) {
  node.removeChild(node.lastChild);
}

Alternatives (slower):

while (node.firstChild) {
  node.removeChild(node.firstChild);
}

while (node.hasChildNodes()) {
  node.removeChild(node.lastChild);
}

Benchmark with the suggested options

Answer 3

innerText is the winner! http://jsperf.com/innerhtml-vs-removechild/133. At all previous tests inner dom of parent node were deleted at first iteration and then innerHTML or removeChild where applied to empty div.

Answer 4

If you only want to have the node without its children you could also make a copy of it like this:

var dupNode = document.getElementById("foo").cloneNode(false);

Depends on what you're trying to achieve.

Answer 5

Generally, JavaScript uses arrays to reference lists of DOM nodes. So, this will work nicely if you have an interest in doing it through the HTMLElements array. Also, worth noting, because I am using an array reference instead of JavaScript proto's this should work in any browser, including IE.

while(nodeArray.length !== 0) {
  nodeArray[0].parentNode.removeChild(nodeArray[0]);
}

Answer 6

Use modern Javascript, with remove!

const parent = document.getElementById("foo")
while (parent.firstChild) {
    parent.firstChild.remove()
}

This is a newer way to write node removal in ES5. It is vanilla JS and reads much nicer than relying on parent.

All modern browsers are supported.

Browser Support - 96% Jun 2020