/react-hotkeys-hook

React hook for using keyboard shortcuts in components.

Primary LanguageTypeScriptMIT LicenseMIT

useHotkeys(keys, callback)

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npm i react-hotkeys-hook

A React hook for using keyboard shortcuts in components in a declarative way.

Quick Start

The easiest way to use the hook.

import { useHotkeys } from 'react-hotkeys-hook'

export const ExampleComponent = () => {
  const [count, setCount] = useState(0)
  useHotkeys('ctrl+k', () => setCount(count + 1), [count])

  return (
    <p>
      Pressed {count} times.
    </p>
  )
}

Scopes

Scopes allow you to group hotkeys together. You can use scopes to prevent hotkeys from colliding with each other.

const App = () => {
  return (
    <HotkeysProvider initiallyActiveScopes={['settings']}>
      <ExampleComponent />
    </HotkeysProvider>
  )
}

export const ExampleComponent = () => {
  const [count, setCount] = useState(0)
  useHotkeys('ctrl+k', () => setCount(prevCount => prevCount + 1), { scopes: ['settings'] })

  return (
    <p>
      Pressed {count} times.
    </p>
  )
}

Changing a scope's active state

You can change the active state of a scope using the disableScope, enableScope and toggleScope functions returned by the useHotkeysContext() hook. Note that you have to have your app wrapped in a <HotkeysProvider> component.

const App = () => {
  return (
    <HotkeysProvider initiallyActiveScopes={['settings']}>
      <ExampleComponent />
    </HotkeysProvider>
  )
}

export const ExampleComponent = () => {
  const { toggleScope } = useHotkeysContext()

  return (
    <button onClick={() => toggleScope('settings')}>
      Change scope active state
    </button>
  )
}

Focus trap

This will only trigger the hotkey if the component is focused.

export const ExampleComponent = () => {
  const [count, setCount] = useState(0)
  const ref = useHotkeys<HTMLParagraphElement>('ctrl+k', () => setCount(prevCount => prevCount + 1))

  return (
    <p tabIndex={-1} ref={ref}>
      Pressed {count} times.
    </p>
  )
}

Documentation & Live Examples

API

useHotkeys(keys, callback)

useHotkeys(keys: string | string[], callback: (event: KeyboardEvent, handler: HotkeysEvent) => void, options: Options = {}, deps: DependencyList = [])
Parameter Type Required? Default value Description
keys string or string[] required - set the hotkeys you want the hook to listen to. You can use single or multiple keys, modifier combinations, etc. This will either be a string or an array of strings. To separate multiple keys, use a colon. This split key value can be overridden with the splitKey option.
callback (event: KeyboardEvent, handler: HotkeysEvent) => void required - This is the callback function that will be called when the hotkey is pressed. The callback will receive the browsers native KeyboardEvent and the libraries HotkeysEvent.
options Options optional {} Object to modify the behavior of the hook. Default options are given below.
dependencies DependencyList optional [] The given callback will always be memoised inside the hook. So if you reference any outside variables, you need to set them here for the callback to get updated (Much like useCallback works in React).

Options

All options are optional and have a default value which you can override to change the behavior of the hook.

Option Type Default value Description
enabled boolean or (keyboardEvent: KeyboardEvent, hotkeysEvent: HotkeysEvent) => boolean true This option determines whether the hotkey is active or not. It can take a boolean (for example a flag from a state outside) or a function which gets executed once the hotkey is pressed. If the function returns false the hotkey won't get executed and all browser events are prevented.
enableOnFormTags boolean or FormTags[] false By default hotkeys are not registered if a focus focuses on an input field. This will prevent accidental triggering of hotkeys when the user is typing. If you want to enable hotkeys, use this option. Setting it to true will enable on all form tags, otherwise you can give an array of form tags to enable the hotkey on (possible options are: ['input', 'textarea', 'select'])
enableOnContentEditable boolean false Set this option to enable hotkeys on tags that have set the contentEditable prop to true
combinationKey string + Character to indicate keystrokes like shift+c. You might want to change this if you want to listen to the + character like ctrl-+.
splitKey string , Character to separate different keystrokes like ctrl+a, ctrl+b.
scopes string or string[] * With scopes you can group hotkeys together. The default scope is the wildcard * which matches all hotkeys. Use the <HotkeysProvider> component to change active scopes.
keyup boolean false Determines whether to listen to the browsers keyup event for triggering the callback.
keydown boolean true Determines whether to listen to the browsers keydown event for triggering the callback. If you set both keyupand keydown to true, the callback will trigger on both events.
preventDefault boolean or (keyboardEvent: KeyboardEvent, hotkeysEvent: HotkeysEvent) => boolean false Set this to a true if you want the hook to prevent the browsers default behavior on certain keystrokes like meta+s to save a page. NOTE: Certain keystrokes are not preventable, like meta+w to close a tab in chrome.
description string undefined Use this option to describe what the hotkey does. this is helpful if you want to display a list of active hotkeys to the user.

Overloads

The hooks call signature is very flexible. For example if you don't need to set any special options you can use the dependency array as your third parameter:

useHotkeys('ctrl+k', () => console.log(counter + 1), [counter])

isHotkeyPressed(keys: string | string[], splitKey?: string = ',')

This function allows us to check if the user is currently pressing down a key.

import { isHotkeyPressed } from 'react-hotkeys-hook'

isHotkeyPressed('esc') // Returns true if Escape key is pressed down.

You can also check for multiple keys at the same time:

isHotkeyPressed(['esc', 'ctrl+s']) // Returns true if Escape or Ctrl+S are pressed down.

Support

  • Ask your question in the Github Discussions
  • Ask your question on StackOverflow

Found an issue or have a feature request?

Open up an issue or pull request and participate.

Local Development

Checkout this repo, run yarn or npm i and then run the test script to test the behavior of the hook.

Contributing

Contributions are what make the open source community such an amazing place to learn, inspire, and create. Any contributions you make are greatly appreciated.

  1. Fork the Project
  2. Create your Feature Branch (git checkout -b feature/AmazingFeature)
  3. Commit your Changes (git commit -m 'Add some AmazingFeature')
  4. Push to the Branch (git push origin feature/AmazingFeature)
  5. Open a Pull Request

License

Distributed under the MIT License. See LICENSE for more information.

Contact

Johannes Klauss - @JohannesKlauss - klauss.johannes@gmail.com

Project Link: https://github.com/JohannesKlauss/react-hotkeys-hook

Contributors