Get form data in ReactJS

I have a simple form in my render function, like so:

render : function() {
      return (
        <form>
          <input type="text" name="email" placeholder="Email" />
          <input type="password" name="password" placeholder="Password" />
          <button type="button" onClick={this.handleLogin}>Login</button>
        </form>
      );
    },
handleLogin: function() {
   //How to access email and password here ?
}

What should I write in my handleLogin: function() { ... } to access Email and Password fields?

Solution 1:

There are a few ways to do this:

1) Get values from array of form elements by index

handleSubmit = (event) => {
  event.preventDefault();
  console.log(event.target[0].value)
}

2) Using name attribute in html

handleSubmit = (event) => {
  event.preventDefault();
  console.log(event.target.elements.username.value) // from elements property
  console.log(event.target.username.value)          // or directly
}

<input type="text" name="username"/>

3) Using refs

handleSubmit = (event) => {
  console.log(this.inputNode.value)
}

<input type="text" name="username" ref={node => (this.inputNode = node)}/>

Full example

class NameForm extends React.Component {
  handleSubmit = (event) => {
    event.preventDefault()
    console.log(event.target[0].value)
    console.log(event.target.elements.username.value)
    console.log(event.target.username.value)
    console.log(this.inputNode.value)
  }
  render() {
    return (
      <form onSubmit={this.handleSubmit}>
        <label>
          Name:
          <input
            type="text"
            name="username"
            ref={node => (this.inputNode = node)}
          />
        </label>
        <button type="submit">Submit</button>
      </form>
    )
  }
}

Solution 2:

Use the change events on the inputs to update the component's state and access it in handleLogin:

handleEmailChange: function(e) {
   this.setState({email: e.target.value});
},
handlePasswordChange: function(e) {
   this.setState({password: e.target.value});
},
render : function() {
      return (
        <form>
          <input type="text" name="email" placeholder="Email" value={this.state.email} onChange={this.handleEmailChange} />
          <input type="password" name="password" placeholder="Password" value={this.state.password} onChange={this.handlePasswordChange}/>
          <button type="button" onClick={this.handleLogin}>Login</button>
        </form>);
},
handleLogin: function() {
    console.log("EMail: " + this.state.email);
    console.log("Password: " + this.state.password);
}

Working fiddle.

Also, read the docs, there is a whole section dedicated to form handling: Forms

Previously you could also use React's two-way databinding helper mixin to achieve the same thing, but now it's deprecated in favor of setting the value and change handler (as above):

var ExampleForm = React.createClass({
  mixins: [React.addons.LinkedStateMixin],
  getInitialState: function() {
    return {email: '', password: ''};
  },
  handleLogin: function() {
    console.log("EMail: " + this.state.email);
    console.log("Password: " + this.state.password);
  },
  render: function() {
    return (
      <form>
        <input type="text" valueLink={this.linkState('email')} />
        <input type="password" valueLink={this.linkState('password')} />
        <button type="button" onClick={this.handleLogin}>Login</button>
      </form>
    );
  }
});

Documentation is here: Two-way Binding Helpers.

Solution 3:

An alternative approach is to use the ref attribute and reference the values with this.refs. Here is a simple example:

render: function() {
    return (<form onSubmit={this.submitForm}>
        <input ref="theInput" />
    </form>);
},
submitForm: function(e) {
    e.preventDefault();
    alert(React.findDOMNode(this.refs.theInput).value);
}

More info can be found in the React docs: https://facebook.github.io/react/docs/more-about-refs.html#the-ref-string-attribute

For a lot of the reasons described in How do I use radio buttons in React? this approach isn't always the best, but it does present a useful alternative in some simple cases.