How to Set Active Tab in jQuery Ui

Inside your function for the click action use

$( "#tabs" ).tabs({ active: # });

Where # is replaced by the tab index you want to select.

Edit: change from selected to active, selected is deprecated

Simple jQuery solution - find the <a> element where href="x" and click it:

$('a[href="#tabs-2"]').click();

Just to clarify in complete detail. This is what works with the current version of jQuery Ui

$( "#tabs" ).tabs( "option", "active", # );

where # is the index of the tab you want to make active.

Inside your function for the click action use

$( "#tabs" ).tabs({ active: # });

Where # is replaced by the tab index you want to select.

I know this is an old question. But I think the way to change the selected tab have changed slight

The way to change the active tab now is by giving active the index of the tab. Note the index starts at 0 not 1. To make the second tab active you will use the the index 1.

//this will select your first tab
$( "#tabs" ).tabs({ active: 0 });