Render Html String as Real Html in a React Component

Marcus Vance
Marcus Vance
• • 7 min read

Here's What I Tried and How It Goes Wrong. This Works: This Doesn't: the Description Property Is Just a Normal String of Html Content. However It's Rendered as...

Render Html String as Real Html in a React Component

Here's what I tried and how it goes wrong.

This works:

<div dangerouslySetInnerHTML={{ __html: "<h1>Hi there!</h1>" }} />

This doesn't:

<div dangerouslySetInnerHTML={{ __html: this.props.match.description }} />

The description property is just a normal string of HTML content. However it's rendered as a string, not as HTML for some reason.

Any suggestions?

0

13 Answers

Is this.props.match.description a string or an object? If it's a string, it should be converted to HTML just fine. Example:

class App extends React.Component {

constructor() {
    super();
    this.state = {
      description: '<h1 style="color:red;">something</h1>'
    }
  }
  
  render() {
    return (
      <div dangerouslySetInnerHTML={{ __html: this.state.description }} />
    );
  }
}

ReactDOM.render(<App />, document.getElementById('root'));

Result:

However if description is <h1 style="color:red;">something</h1> without the quotes '', you're going to get:

​Object {
$$typeof: [object Symbol] {},
  _owner: null,
  key: null,
  props: Object {
    children: "something",
    style: "color:red;"
  },
  ref: null,
  type: "h1"
}

If It's a string and you don't see any HTML markup the only problem I see is wrong markup..

UPDATE

If you are dealing with HTML Entities, You need to decode them before sending them to dangerouslySetInnerHTML that's why it's called "dangerously" :)

Working example:

class App extends React.Component {

  constructor() {
    super();
    this.state = {
      description: '&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Our Opportunity:&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;'
    }
  }

   htmlDecode(input){
    var e = document.createElement('div');
    e.innerHTML = input;
    return e.childNodes.length === 0 ? "" : e.childNodes[0].nodeValue;
  }

  render() {
    return (
      <div dangerouslySetInnerHTML={{ __html: this.htmlDecode(this.state.description) }} />
    );
  }
}

ReactDOM.render(<App />, document.getElementById('root'));
5

I use 'react-html-parser'

yarn add react-html-parser

import ReactHtmlParser from 'react-html-parser'; 

<div> { ReactHtmlParser (html_string) } </div>

Source on npmjs.com

Lifting up @okram's comment for more visibility:

from its github description: Converts HTML strings directly into React components avoiding the need to use dangerouslySetInnerHTML from npmjs.com A utility for converting HTML strings into React components. Avoids the use of dangerouslySetInnerHTML and converts standard HTML elements, attributes and inline styles into their React equivalents.

5

Check if the text you're trying to append to the node is not escaped like this:

var prop = {
    match: {
        description: '&lt;h1&gt;Hi there!&lt;/h1&gt;'
    }
};

Instead of this:

var prop = {
    match: {
        description: '<h1>Hi there!</h1>'
    }
};

if is escaped you should convert it from your server-side.

The node is text because is escaped

The node is a dom node because isn't escaped

3

If you have HTML in a string I would recommend using a package called html-react-parser.

Must Read

Installation

NPM:

npm install html-react-parser

yarn:

yarn add html-react-parser
Marcus Vance

Marcus Vance

Cybersecurity & Digital Privacy Researcher
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Marcus Vance is a cybersecurity auditor and technology writer dedicated to educating the public about online safety, data privacy regulations, enterprise security, and emerging cyber threats.