React | How to detect Page Refresh (F5)

I'm using React js. I need to detect page refresh. When user hits refresh icon or press F5, I need to find out the event.

I tried with stackoverflow post by using javascript functions

I used javascript function beforeunload still no luck.

onUnload(event) { 
  alert('page Refreshed')
}

componentDidMount() {
  window.addEventListener("beforeunload", this.onUnload)
}

componentWillUnmount() {
   window.removeEventListener("beforeunload", this.onUnload)
}

here I have full code on stackblitz


Place this in the constructor:

if (window.performance) {
  if (performance.navigation.type == 1) {
    alert( "This page is reloaded" );
  } else {
    alert( "This page is not reloaded");
  }
}

It will work, please see this example on stackblitz.


If you're using React Hook, UseEffect you can put the below changes in your component. It worked for me

useEffect(() => {
    window.addEventListener("beforeunload", alertUser);
    return () => {
      window.removeEventListener("beforeunload", alertUser);
    };
  }, []);
  const alertUser = (e) => {
    e.preventDefault();
    e.returnValue = "";
  };

Your code seems to be working just fine, your alert won't work because you aren't stopping the refresh. If you console.log('hello') the output is shown.

UPDATE ---

This should stop the user refreshing but it depends on what you want to happen.

componentDidMount() {
    window.onbeforeunload = function() {
        this.onUnload();
        return "";
    }.bind(this);
}

Unfortunately currently accepted answer cannot be more considered as acceptable since performance.navigation.type is deprecated

The newest API for that is experimental ATM. As a workaround I can only suggest to save some value in redux (or whatever you use) store to indicate state after reload and on first route change update it to indicate that route was changed not because of refresh.