BrowserWindow
Create and control browser windows.
Process: Main
This module cannot be used until the ready event of the app
module is emitted.
// In the main process.
const { BrowserWindow } = require('electron')
const win = new BrowserWindow({ width: 800, height: 600 })
// Load a remote URL
win.loadURL('https://github.com')
// Or load a local HTML file
win.loadFile('index.html')
Window customization
The BrowserWindow class exposes various ways to modify the look and behavior of
your app's windows. For more details, see the Window Customization
tutorial.
Showing the window gracefully
When loading a page in the window directly, users may see the page load incrementally, which is not a good experience for a native app. To make the window display without a visual flash, there are two solutions for different situations.
Using the ready-to-show event
While loading the page, the ready-to-show event will be emitted when the renderer
process has rendered the page for the first time if the window has not been shown yet. Showing
the window after this event will have no visual flash:
const { BrowserWindow } = require('electron')
const win = new BrowserWindow({ show: false })
win.once('ready-to-show', () => {
win.show()
})
This event is usually emitted after the did-finish-load event, but for
pages with many remote resources, it may be emitted before the did-finish-load
event.
Please note that using this event implies that the renderer will be considered "visible" and
paint even though show is false. This event will never fire if you use paintWhenInitiallyHidden: false
Setting the backgroundColor property
For a complex app, the ready-to-show event could be emitted too late, making
the app feel slow. In this case, it is recommended to show the window
immediately, and use a backgroundColor close to your app's background:
const { BrowserWindow } = require('electron')
const win = new BrowserWindow({ backgroundColor: '#2e2c29' })
win.loadURL('https://github.com')
Note that even for apps that use ready-to-show event, it is still recommended
to set backgroundColor to make the app feel more native.
Some examples of valid backgroundColor values include:
const win = new BrowserWindow()
win.setBackgroundColor('hsl(230, 100%, 50%)')
win.setBackgroundColor('rgb(255, 145, 145)')
win.setBackgroundColor('#ff00a3')
win.setBackgroundColor('blueviolet')
For more information about these color types see valid options in win.setBackgroundColor.
Parent and child windows
By using parent option, you can create child windows:
const { BrowserWindow } = require('electron')
const top = new BrowserWindow()
const child = new BrowserWindow({ parent: top })
child.show()
top.show()
The child window will always show on top of the top window.
Modal windows
A modal window is a child window that disables parent window. To create a modal
window, you have to set both the parent and modal options:
const { BrowserWindow } = require('electron')
const top = new BrowserWindow()
const child = new BrowserWindow({ parent: top, modal: true, show: false })
child.loadURL('https://github.com')
child.once('ready-to-show', () => {
child.show()
})
Page visibility
The Page Visibility API works as follows:
- On all platforms, the visibility state tracks whether the window is hidden/minimized or not.
- Additionally, on macOS, the visibility state also tracks the window
occlusion state. If the window is occluded (i.e. fully covered) by another
window, the visibility state will be
hidden. On other platforms, the visibility state will behiddenonly when the window is minimized or explicitly hidden withwin.hide(). - If a
BrowserWindowis created withshow: false, the initial visibility state will bevisibledespite the window actually being hidden. - If
backgroundThrottlingis disabled, the visibility state will remainvisibleeven if the window is minimized, occluded, or hidden.
It is recommended that you pause expensive operations when the visibility
state is hidden in order to minimize power consumption.
Platform notices
- On macOS modal windows will be displayed as sheets attached to the parent window.
- On macOS the child windows will keep the relative position to parent window when parent window moves, while on Windows and Linux child windows will not move.
- On Linux the type of modal windows will be changed to
dialog. - On Linux many desktop environments do not support hiding a modal window.
Class: BrowserWindow extends BaseWindow
Create and control browser windows.
Process: Main
BrowserWindow is an EventEmitter.
It creates a new BrowserWindow with native properties as set by the options.
new BrowserWindow([options])
Instance Events
Objects created with new BrowserWindow emit the following events:
Note: Some events are only available on specific operating systems and are labeled as such.
Event: 'page-title-updated'
Returns:
eventEventtitlestringexplicitSetboolean
Emitted when the document changed its title, calling event.preventDefault()
will prevent the native window's title from changing.
explicitSet is false when title is synthesized from file URL.
Event: 'close'
Returns:
eventEvent
Emitted when the window is going to be closed. It's emitted before the
beforeunload and unload event of the DOM. Calling event.preventDefault()
will cancel the close.
Usually you would want to use the beforeunload handler to decide whether the
window should be closed, which will also be called when the window is
reloaded. In Electron, returning any value other than undefined would cancel the
close. For example:
window.onbeforeunload = (e) => {
console.log('I do not want to be closed')
// Unlike usual browsers that a message box will be prompted to users, returning
// a non-void value will silently cancel the close.
// It is recommended to use the dialog API to let the user confirm closing the
// application.
e.returnValue = false
}
Note: There is a subtle difference between the behaviors of window.onbeforeunload = handler and window.addEventListener('beforeunload', handler). It is recommended to always set the event.returnValue explicitly, instead of only returning a value, as the former works more consistently within Electron.
Event: 'closed'
Emitted when the window is closed. After you have received this event you should remove the reference to the window and avoid using it any more.
Event: 'session-end' Windows
Emitted when window session is going to end due to force shutdown or machine restart or session log off.
Event: 'unresponsive'
Emitted when the web page becomes unresponsive.
Event: 'responsive'
Emitted when the unresponsive web page becomes responsive again.
Event: 'blur'
Emitted when the window loses focus.
Event: 'focus'
Emitted when the window gains focus.
Event: 'show'
Emitted when the window is shown.
Event: 'hide'
Emitted when the window is hidden.
Event: 'ready-to-show'
Emitted when the web page has been rendered (while not being shown) and window can be displayed without a visual flash.
Please note that using this event implies that the renderer will be considered "visible" and
paint even though show is false. This event will never fire if you use paintWhenInitiallyHidden: false
Event: 'maximize'
Emitted when window is maximized.
Event: 'unmaximize'
Emitted when the window exits from a maximized state.
Event: 'minimize'
Emitted when the window is minimized.
Event: 'restore'
Emitted when the window is restored from a minimized state.
Event: 'will-resize' macOS Windows
Returns:
eventEventnewBoundsRectangle - Size the window is being resized to.detailsObjectedge(string) - The edge of the window being dragged for resizing. Can bebottom,left,right,top-left,top-right,bottom-leftorbottom-right.
Emitted before the window is resized. Calling event.preventDefault() will prevent the window from being resized.
Note that this is only emitted when the window is being resized manually. Resizing the window with setBounds/setSize will not emit this event.
The possible values and behaviors of the edge option are platform dependent. Possible values are:
- On Windows, possible values are
bottom,top,left,right,top-left,top-right,bottom-left,bottom-right. - On macOS, possible values are
bottomandright.- The value
bottomis used to denote vertical resizing. - The value
rightis used to denote horizontal resizing.
- The value
Event: 'resize'
Emitted after the window has been resized.
Event: 'resized' macOS Windows
Emitted once when the window has finished being resized.
This is usually emitted when the window has been resized manually. On macOS, resizing the window with setBounds/setSize and setting the animate parameter to true will also emit this event once resizing has finished.
Event: 'will-move' macOS Windows
Returns:
eventEventnewBoundsRectangle - Location the window is being moved to.
Emitted before the window is moved. On Windows, calling event.preventDefault() will prevent the window from being moved.
Note that this is only emitted when the window is being moved manually. Moving the window with setPosition/setBounds/center will not emit this event.
Event: 'move'
Emitted when the window is being moved to a new position.
Event: 'moved' macOS Windows
Emitted once when the window is moved to a new position.
Note: On macOS this event is an alias of move.
Event: 'enter-full-screen'
Emitted when the window enters a full-screen state.
Event: 'leave-full-screen'
Emitted when the window leaves a full-screen state.
Event: 'enter-html-full-screen'
Emitted when the window enters a full-screen state triggered by HTML API.
Event: 'leave-html-full-screen'
Emitted when the window leaves a full-screen state triggered by HTML API.
Event: 'always-on-top-changed'
Returns:
eventEventisAlwaysOnTopboolean
Emitted when the window is set or unset to show always on top of other windows.
Event: 'app-command' Windows Linux
Returns:
eventEventcommandstring
Emitted when an App Command is invoked. These are typically related to keyboard media keys or browser commands, as well as the "Back" button built into some mice on Windows.
Commands are lowercased, underscores are replaced with hyphens, and the
APPCOMMAND_ prefix is stripped off.
e.g. APPCOMMAND_BROWSER_BACKWARD is emitted as browser-backward.
const { BrowserWindow } = require('electron')
const win = new BrowserWindow()
win.on('app-command', (e, cmd) => {
// Navigate the window back when the user hits their mouse back button
if (cmd === 'browser-backward' && win.webContents.canGoBack()) {
win.webContents.goBack()
}
})
The following app commands are explicitly supported on Linux:
browser-backwardbrowser-forward
Event: 'swipe' macOS
Returns:
eventEventdirectionstring
Emitted on 3-finger swipe. Possible directions are up, right, down, left.
The method underlying this event is built to handle older macOS-style trackpad swiping,
where the content on the screen doesn't move with the swipe. Most macOS trackpads are not
configured to allow this kind of swiping anymore, so in order for it to emit properly the
'Swipe between pages' preference in System Preferences > Trackpad > More Gestures must be
set to 'Swipe with two or three fingers'.
Event: 'rotate-gesture' macOS
Returns:
eventEventrotationFloat
Emitted on trackpad rotation gesture. Continually emitted until rotation gesture is
ended. The rotation value on each emission is the angle in degrees rotated since
the last emission. The last emitted event upon a rotation gesture will always be of
value 0. Counter-clockwise rotation values are positive, while clockwise ones are
negative.
Event: 'sheet-begin' macOS
Emitted when the window opens a sheet.
Event: 'sheet-end' macOS
Emitted when the window has closed a sheet.
Event: 'new-window-for-tab' macOS
Emitted when the native new tab button is clicked.
Event: 'system-context-menu' Windows
Returns:
eventEventpointPoint - The screen coordinates the context menu was triggered at
Emitted when the system context menu is triggered on the window, this is
normally only triggered when the user right clicks on the non-client area
of your window. This is the window titlebar or any area you have declared
as -webkit-app-region: drag in a frameless window.
Calling event.preventDefault() will prevent the menu from being displayed.
Static Methods
The BrowserWindow class has the following static methods:
BrowserWindow.getAllWindows()
Returns BrowserWindow[] - An array of all opened browser windows.
BrowserWindow.getFocusedWindow()
Returns BrowserWindow | null - The window that is focused in this application, otherwise returns null.
BrowserWindow.fromWebContents(webContents)
webContentsWebContents
Returns BrowserWindow | null - The window that owns the given webContents
or null if the contents are not owned by a window.
BrowserWindow.fromBrowserView(browserView) Deprecated
browserViewBrowserView
Note The
BrowserViewclass is deprecated, and replaced by the newWebContentsViewclass.
Returns BrowserWindow | null - The window that owns the given browserView. If the given view is not attached to any window, returns null.
BrowserWindow.fromId(id)
idInteger
Returns BrowserWindow | null - The window with the given id.
Instance Properties
Objects created with new BrowserWindow have the following properties:
const { BrowserWindow } = require('electron')
// In this example `win` is our instance
const win = new BrowserWindow({ width: 800, height: 600 })
win.loadURL('https://github.com')
win.webContents Readonly
A WebContents object this window owns. All web page related events and
operations will be done via it.
See the webContents documentation for its methods and
events.
win.id Readonly
A Integer property representing the unique ID of the window. Each ID is unique among all BrowserWindow instances of the entire Electron application.
win.tabbingIdentifier macOS Readonly
A string (optional) property that is equal to the tabbingIdentifier passed to the BrowserWindow constructor or undefined if none was set.
win.autoHideMenuBar
A boolean property that determines whether the window menu bar should hide itself automatically. Once set, the menu bar will only show when users press the single Alt key.
If the menu bar is already visible, setting this property to true won't
hide it immediately.
win.simpleFullScreen
A boolean property that determines whether the window is in simple (pre-Lion) fullscreen mode.
win.fullScreen
A boolean property that determines whether the window is in fullscreen mode.
win.focusable Windows macOS
A boolean property that determines whether the window is focusable.
win.visibleOnAllWorkspaces macOS Linux
A boolean property that determines whether the window is visible on all workspaces.
Note: Always returns false on Windows.
win.shadow
A boolean property that determines whether the window has a shadow.
win.menuBarVisible Windows Linux
A boolean property that determines whether the menu bar should be visible.
Note: If the menu bar is auto-hide, users can still bring up the menu bar by pressing the single Alt key.
win.kiosk
A boolean property that determines whether the window is in kiosk mode.
win.documentEdited macOS
A boolean property that specifies whether the window’s document has been edited.
The icon in title bar will become gray when set to true.
win.representedFilename macOS
A string property that determines the pathname of the file the window represents,
and the icon of the file will show in window's title bar.
win.title
A string property that determines the title of the native window.
Note: The title of the web page can be different from the title of the native window.
win.minimizable macOS Windows
A boolean property that determines whether the window can be manually minimized by user.
On Linux the setter is a no-op, although the getter returns true.
win.maximizable macOS Windows
A boolean property that determines whether the window can be manually maximized by user.
On Linux the setter is a no-op, although the getter returns true.
win.fullScreenable
A boolean property that determines whether the maximize/zoom window button toggles fullscreen mode or
maximizes the window.
win.resizable
A boolean property that determines whether the window can be manually resized by user.
win.closable macOS Windows
A boolean property that determines whether the window can be manually closed by user.
On Linux the setter is a no-op, although the getter returns true.
win.movable macOS Windows
A boolean property that determines Whether the window can be moved by user.
On Linux the setter is a no-op, although the getter returns true.
win.excludedFromShownWindowsMenu macOS
A boolean property that determines whether the window is excluded from the application’s Windows menu. false by default.
const win = new BrowserWindow({ height: 600, width: 600 })
const template = [
{
role: 'windowmenu'
}
]
win.excludedFromShownWindowsMenu = true
const menu = Menu.buildFromTemplate(template)
Menu.setApplicationMenu(menu)
win.accessibleTitle
A string property that defines an alternative title provided only to
accessibility tools such as screen readers. This string is not directly
visible to users.
Instance Methods
Objects created with new BrowserWindow have the following instance methods:
Note: Some methods are only available on specific operating systems and are labeled as such.
win.destroy()
Force closing the window, the unload and beforeunload event won't be emitted
for the web page, and close event will also not be emitted
for this window, but it guarantees the closed event will be emitted.
win.close()
Try to close the window. This has the same effect as a user manually clicking the close button of the window. The web page may cancel the close though. See the close event.
win.focus()
Focuses on the window.
win.blur()
Removes focus from the window.
win.isFocused()
Returns boolean - Whether the window is focused.
win.isDestroyed()
Returns boolean - Whether the window is destroyed.
win.show()
Shows and gives focus to the window.
win.showInactive()
Shows the window but doesn't focus on it.
win.hide()
Hides the window.
win.isVisible()
Returns boolean - Whether the window is visible to the user in the foreground of the app.
win.isModal()
Returns boolean - Whether current window is a modal window.
win.maximize()
Maximizes the window. This will also show (but not focus) the window if it isn't being displayed already.