HTML DOM firstChild Property

Last Updated : 13 Jun, 2023

The DOM firstChild Property is used to return the firstchild Node of its parent node element. It is read-only property and may return an element node, a text node or a comment node.

Syntax:

node.firstChild

Return Value: It returns a string value which represent the first child of a node. If the element does not have a child node then it returns a null value.

Note: Whitespace inside the parent elements is considered as text, and text is considered as nodes.

Example-1:

html

<!DOCTYPE html> 
<html> 
<head> 
    <style> 
        h1 { 
            color: green; 
        } 
    </style> 
</head> 
  
<body style="margin-left:140px;"> 
    <h1>GeeksForGeeks</h1> 
    <h2>DOM firstChild Property </h2> 
  
      
<p>List of sorting::</p> 
  
    <ul id="GFG"><li>Merge Sort</li> 
    <li>Quick Sort</li> 
    <li>Selection Sort</li> 
    <li>Bubble Sort</li> 
    </ul> 
    <button onclick="Geeks()">Submit</button> 
    <p id="sudo"></p> 
  
    <script> 
        function Geeks() { 
            var x = 
            document.getElementById("GFG").firstChild.innerHTML; 
            document.getElementById("sudo").innerHTML = x; 
        } 
    </script> 
</body> 
  
</html> 

Output:

Before clicking on the Button:

After clicking on the button:

Example-2: To get the node name of the first child-

html

<!DOCTYPE html> 
<html> 
    <head> 
        <style> 
            h1 { 
                color: green; 
            } 
              
            #GFG { 
                font-size: 20px; 
            } 
        </style> 
    </head> 
      
    <body style="margin-left:140px;"> 
        <h1>GeeksForGeeks</h1> 
        <h2>DOM firstChild Property </h2> 
        <div id="GFG"> 
<p>first Node</p> 
<span>Second Node</span> 
              
<p>ThirdNode</p> 
  
        </div> 
        <br> 
        <button onclick="Geeks()">Submit</button> 
      
        <p id="sudo" style="font-size:25PX;"></p> 
  
      
        <script> 
            function Geeks() { 
                var x = 
                document.getElementById("GFG").firstChild.nodeName; 
                document.getElementById("sudo").innerHTML = 
                "node name of the first child node " 
                + "of a <div> element:" + x; 
            } 
        </script> 
    </body> 
</html>                 