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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-28T01:17:35+00:00

I have an HTML form that currently just posts the data directly to a

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I have an HTML form that currently just posts the data directly to a PHP file. I want to update the code so that the submit button sends the data to a JavaScript function so that I can create an AJAX function. Is it possible for the submit button to activate a JavaScript function rather than posting to a php file? The only thing I have come up with is below, which quite obviously does not work:

<html>
<head>
<script type="text/javascript">
function ajax(){
  //...
}
</script>
</head>

<body>
<form action="ajax();">
  <!-- ... -->
  <input type="submit" value="Submit" />
</form>
</body>
</html>
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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    You can give the “submit” input a “click” handler that explicitly prevents the default behavior from being carried out.

    <input type='submit' value='Submit' onclick='ajax(event)'>

    Then in the function:

    function ajax(event) {
  if ('preventDefault' in event) event.preventDefault();
  event.returnValue = false; // for IE before IE9
  // ...
}

    edit @Esailija points out correctly that another option is to handle the “submit” event on the <form> element instead. The function would look pretty much the same, in fact exactly the same, but you’d wire it up like this:

    <form id='yourForm' onsubmit='ajax(event)'>

    That will also trap things like the “Enter” key action, etc.

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