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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-25T14:16:35+00:00

The following code is for reliable cross-browser IE version detection <!–[if lt IE 7

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The following code is for reliable cross-browser IE version detection

<!--[if lt IE 7 ]><body class="ie_6"><![endif]-->
<!--[if IE 7 ]><body class="ie_7"><![endif]-->
<!--[if IE 8 ]><body class="ie_8"><![endif]-->
<!--[if IE 9 ]><body class="ie_9"><![endif]-->
<!--[if (gt IE 9)|!(IE)]><!-->
<body>
<!--<![endif]-->

What I don’t understand is, why it’s working.Why the normal <body> didn’t overwrite the <body class="ie_9"> since it is just a normal tag, should be recognized by all the browsers.

What’s the magic about 

    <!-->
    <body>
    <!--
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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    You probably want to change !(IE) to (!IE)

    Also, the “normal” <body> tag you’re talking about is in a conditional comment. The fact that it’s on a different line doesn’t matter, it’s still inside the conditional comment tag, so is affected as such.

    Conditional comments for IE work by using normal HTML comments <!-- --> so any code inside a “false” conditional is just commented out; <!-- <body class="ie6"> --> IE then has its own syntax inside of that. As such, non-IE browsers just see a commented string, and IE treats it as a statement to execute.

    Because of this, only one body tag shows, and only that one gets used.

    More explanation of

    <!--[if (gt IE 9)|!(IE)]><!-->
<body>
<!--<![endif]-->

    To IE, this says:

    <if greater than ie9, or not ie> (ie conditional comment)
<!--> (empty comment) (--> putting this here to stop SO ruining syntax highlighting :D)
<body>
<end if> (ie conditional comment)

    If you don’t understand why, read the paragraph starting “Conditional comments for IE work…”.

    This same block, to any other browser looks like this:

    <!--[if (gt IE 9)|!(IE)]><!--> (this is just one comment, containing the text "[if (gt IE 9)|!(IE)]><!")
<body>
<!--<![endif]--> (again, just one comment, containing "<![endif]")
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