Find html label associated with a given input

If you are using jQuery you can do something like this

$('label[for="foo"]').hide ();

If you aren't using jQuery you'll have to search for the label. Here is a function that takes the element as an argument and returns the associated label

function findLableForControl(el) {
   var idVal = el.id;
   labels = document.getElementsByTagName('label');
   for( var i = 0; i < labels.length; i++ ) {
      if (labels[i].htmlFor == idVal)
           return labels[i];
   }
}

First, scan the page for labels, and assign a reference to the label from the actual form element:

var labels = document.getElementsByTagName('LABEL');
for (var i = 0; i < labels.length; i++) {
    if (labels[i].htmlFor != '') {
         var elem = document.getElementById(labels[i].htmlFor);
         if (elem)
            elem.label = labels[i];         
    }
}

Then, you can simply go:

document.getElementById('MyFormElem').label.innerHTML = 'Look ma this works!';

No need for a lookup array :)

There is a labels property in the HTML5 standard which points to labels which are associated to an input element.

So you could use something like this (support for native labels property but with a fallback for retrieving labels in case the browser doesn't support it)...

var getLabelsForInputElement = function(element) {
    var labels = [];
    var id = element.id;

    if (element.labels) {
        return element.labels;
    }

    id && Array.prototype.push
        .apply(labels, document.querySelector("label[for='" + id + "']"));

    while (element = element.parentNode) {
        if (element.tagName.toLowerCase() == "label") {
            labels.push(element);
        }  
    }

    return labels;
};

// ES6
var getLabelsForInputElement = (element) => {
    let labels;
    let id = element.id;

    if (element.labels) {
        return element.labels;
    }

    if (id) {
        labels = Array.from(document.querySelector(`label[for='${id}']`)));
    }

    while (element = element.parentNode) {
        if (element.tagName.toLowerCase() == "label") {
            labels.push(element);
        }  
    }

    return labels;
};

Even easier if you're using jQuery...

var getLabelsForInputElement = function(element) {
    var labels = $();
    var id = element.id;

    if (element.labels) {
        return element.labels;
    }

    id && (labels = $("label[for='" + id  + "']")));

    labels = labels.add($(element).parents("label"));

    return labels;
};

I am a bit surprised that nobody seems to know that you're perfectly allowed to do:

<label>Put your stuff here: <input value="Stuff"></label>

Which won't get picked up by any of the suggested answers, but will label the input correctly.

Here's some code that does take this case into account:

$.fn.getLabels = function() {
    return this.map(function() {
        var labels = $(this).parents('label');
        if (this.id) {
            labels.add('label[for="' + this.id + '"]');
        }
        return labels.get();
    });
};

Usage:

$('#myfancyinput').getLabels();

Some notes:

The code was written for clarity, not for performance. More performant alternatives may be available.
This code supports getting the labels of multiple items in one go. If that's not what you want, adapt as necessary.
This still doesn't take care of things like aria-labelledby if you were to use that (left as an exercise to the reader).
Using multiple labels is a tricky business when it comes to support in different user agents and assistive technologies, so test well and use at your own risk, etc. etc.
Yes, you could also implement this without using jQuery. :-)

document.querySelector("label[for=" + vHtmlInputElement.id + "]");

This answers the question in the simplest and leanest manner. This uses vanilla javascript and works on all main-stream proper browsers.

Find html label associated with a given input

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