# jQuery children() Method

jQuery Traversing Methods

## Example

Return elements that are direct children of <ul>:

$(document).ready(function(){
$("ul").children().css({"color":"red","border":"2px solid red"});
});

Result:

body (great-grandparent)
div (grandparent)

ul (parent)
- li (child) span (grandchild)

Try it yourself »

## Definition and Usage

The children() method returns all direct children of the selected element.

The DOM tree: This method only traverse a single level down the DOM tree. To traverse down multiple levels (to return grandchildren or other descendants), use the find() method.

Tip: To traverse a single level up the DOM tree, or all the way up to the document's root element (to return parents or other ancestors), use the parent() or parents() method.

Note: This method does not return text nodes. To return all children including text nodes, use the contents() method.

## Syntax

$(selector).children(filter)

Parameter | Description
--- | ---
filter | Optional. Specifies a selector expression to narrow down the search for children

## Try it Yourself - Examples

Return all direct children of <ul>
How to return all direct children of an <ul> element.

Narrow down the search
How to use the filter parameter to return all <li> elements with the class name "1", that are direct children of <ul>.

Return all <p> elements that are direct children of <div>
How to select all <p> elements that are direct children of their parent <div> element.

Show the descendants of an element by tag names
A demonstration which shows who the descendants of a <div> element actually are.

jQuery Traversing Methods

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