Kevin Powell - Community•16mo ago

document.getElementById() not working

Hello, I tried to use event listener on an element but document.getElementById() returns null instead of the element. The problem is that I can't find any problem and I tired the code on multiple online compiler and it worked in all of them but it doesn't work on VScode. HTML:

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
  <head>
    <meta charset="utf-8" />
    <meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge" />
    <title>Page Title</title>
    <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1" />
    <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" media="screen" href="main.css" />
    <script src="main.js"></script>
  </head>
  <body>
    <button id="test">test</button>
  </body>
</html>

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
  <head>
    <meta charset="utf-8" />
    <meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge" />
    <title>Page Title</title>
    <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1" />
    <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" media="screen" href="main.css" />
    <script src="main.js"></script>
  </head>
  <body>
    <button id="test">test</button>
  </body>
</html>

JavaScript:

let test = document.getElementById("test");
console.log(test);

test.addEventListener("click", () => {
  console.log("test passed");
});

let test = document.getElementById("test");
console.log(test);

test.addEventListener("click", () => {
  console.log("test passed");
});

5 Replies

Mannix•16mo ago

if you load script file in the head add defer attribute on it 😉

Wolle•16mo ago

Your <script> gets run the moment it gets loaded, that is probably before the HTML is fully parsed. To counter this, you can add defer to your <script>, so it gets loaded after the HTML is rendered.

8OP•16mo ago

The funny part is that I just learned this yesterday I am so dumb

Wolle•16mo ago

Naw, some things just take a few times doing them wrong till they stick 😉 just keep at it

8OP•16mo ago

Thank you very much!

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document.getElementById() not working