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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-13T19:41:09+00:00

I would like to add text to my webpage as a label and make

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I would like to add text to my webpage as a label and make it unselectable.

In other words, When the mouse cursor is over the text I would like it to not turn into a text selecting cursor at all.

A good example of what I’m trying to achieve is the buttons on this website (Questions,Tags,Users,…)

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    You can’t do this with plain vanilla HTML, so JSF can’t do much for you here as well.

    If you’re targeting decent browsers only, then just make use of CSS3:

    .unselectable {
    -webkit-touch-callout: none;
    -webkit-user-select: none;
    -khtml-user-select: none;
    -moz-user-select: none;
    -ms-user-select: none;
    user-select: none;
}

    <label class="unselectable">Unselectable label</label>

    If you’d like to cover older browsers as well, then consider this JavaScript fallback:

    <!doctype html>
<html lang="en">
    <head>
        <title>SO question 2310734</title>
        <script>
            window.onload = function() {
                var labels = document.getElementsByTagName('label');
                for (var i = 0; i < labels.length; i++) {
                    disableSelection(labels[i]);
                }
            };
            function disableSelection(element) {
                if (typeof element.onselectstart != 'undefined') {
                    element.onselectstart = function() { return false; };
                } else if (typeof element.style.MozUserSelect != 'undefined') {
                    element.style.MozUserSelect = 'none';
                } else {
                    element.onmousedown = function() { return false; };
                }
            }
        </script>
    </head>
    <body>
        <label>Try to select this</label>
    </body>
</html>

    If you’re already using jQuery, then here’s another example which adds a new function disableSelection() to jQuery so that you can use it anywhere in your jQuery code:

    <!doctype html>
<html lang="en">
    <head>
        <title>SO question 2310734 with jQuery</title>
        <script src="http://code.jquery.com/jquery-latest.min.js"></script>
        <script>
            $.fn.extend({ 
                disableSelection: function() { 
                    this.each(function() { 
                        if (typeof this.onselectstart != 'undefined') {
                            this.onselectstart = function() { return false; };
                        } else if (typeof this.style.MozUserSelect != 'undefined') {
                            this.style.MozUserSelect = 'none';
                        } else {
                            this.onmousedown = function() { return false; };
                        }
                    }); 
                } 
            });

            $(document).ready(function() {
                $('label').disableSelection();            
            });
        </script>
    </head>
    <body>
        <label>Try to select this</label>
    </body>
</html>
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