Context menus

The context menu is a configurable component that appears when the user right clicks in the editable area. By default it does not disable the operating system’s native context menu, if there are no items to display at the cursor position the native context menu will be shown.

The context menu supports both individual menu items and dynamic context menu sections.

Interactive example

  • TinyMCE

  • HTML

  • JS

  • Edit on CodePen

<textarea id="context-menu">
  <p><img style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" title="Tiny Logo" src="https://www.tiny.cloud/docs/images/logos/android-chrome-256x256.png" alt="TinyMCE Logo" width="128" height="128"></p>

  <h2 style="text-align: center;">Welcome to the TinyMCE editor demo!</h2>

  <p>
    Please try out the features provided in this basic example.<br>
    Note that any <strong>MoxieManager</strong> file and image management functionality in this example is part of our commercial offering – the demo is to show the integration.
  </p>

  <h2>Got questions or need help?</h2>

  <ul>
    <li>Our <a href="https://www.tiny.cloud/docs/tinymce/6/">documentation</a> is a great resource for learning how to configure TinyMCE.</li>
    <li>Have a specific question? Try the <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/tinymce" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><code>tinymce</code> tag at Stack Overflow</a>.</li>
    <li>We also offer enterprise grade support as part of <a href="https://www.tiny.cloud/pricing">TinyMCE premium plans</a>.</li>
  </ul>

  <h2>A simple table to play with</h2>

  <table style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 100%;" border="1">
    <thead>
      <tr>
        <th>Product</th>
        <th>Cost</th>
        <th>Really?</th>
      </tr>
    </thead>
    <tbody>
      <tr>
        <td>TinyMCE</td>
        <td>Free</td>
        <td>YES!</td>
      </tr>
      <tr>
        <td>Plupload</td>
        <td>Free</td>
        <td>YES!</td>
      </tr>
    </tbody>
  </table>

  <h2>Found a bug?</h2>

  <p>
    If you think you have found a bug please create an issue on the <a href="https://github.com/tinymce/tinymce/issues">GitHub repo</a> to report it to the developers.
  </p>

  <h2>Finally ...</h2>

  <p>
    Don't forget to check out our other product <a href="http://www.plupload.com" target="_blank">Plupload</a>, your ultimate upload solution featuring HTML5 upload support.
  </p>
  <p>
    Thanks for supporting TinyMCE! We hope it helps you and your users create great content.<br>All the best from the TinyMCE team.
  </p>
</textarea>
tinymce.init({
  selector: 'textarea#context-menu',
  height: 500,
  plugins: 'link image table lists',
  contextmenu: 'link image table',
  content_style: 'body { font-family:Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size:16px }'
});

Options

contextmenu

The contextmenu option allows you to specify which items appear on the context menu. The format of this option is a space separated list of items in a string.

The context menu option accepts three styles of item:

  • Any registered menu item.

  • A "|" pipe character to indicate a separator should be added to delineate a group of menu items.

  • Context menu sections defined by a plugin (usually equal to the plugin name). Separators are automatically inserted between context menu sections.

If the same name is registered as both a context menu section and a menu item, the context menu section takes preference.

The default configuration includes the context menu sections for the following plugins: link, linkchecker , image, editimage, permanentpen, table, and tinymcespellchecker.

To disable the editor’s context menu, set this option to false.

Type: String or false

Default value: 'link linkchecker image editimage table spellchecker configurepermanentpen'

When the TinyMCE context menu is enabled, users can still access the browser context menu, including the browser spellchecker, using the Ctrl+Right click shortcut. However if the contextmenu_never_use_native option is enabled, holding the Ctrl key will have no effect.
When a TinyMCE context menu is configured, a user on a mobile device can access the TinyMCE context menu by a long press. However, when a TinyMCE context menu is not configured but a TinyMCE context toolbar is, long press will instead open the context toolbar.
The native context menu on a mobile device can still be accessed with a TinyMCE context menu configured, either by a single tap on iOS, or by a double tap on Android. However if the contextmenu_never_use_native option is enabled, neither single nor double tap will have any effect.

Example: using contextmenu

tinymce.init({
  selector: 'textarea',  // change this value according to your HTML
  plugins: 'link image table',
  contextmenu: 'link image table'
});

contextmenu_never_use_native

The contextmenu_never_use_native option allows you to prevent the browser context menu from appearing within the editor.

Using this option may result in unexpected behavior when right-clicking in text areas. We advise you to consider all your options carefully before using this feature.

Type: Boolean

Default value: false

Example: using contextmenu_never_use_native

tinymce.init({
  selector: 'textarea',  // change this value according to your HTML
  contextmenu_never_use_native: true
});

Available context menu sections

The following table shows all context menu sections, including sections provided by plugins. Any menu item can also be added to the context menu. To retrieve a list from the editor, run the following command from the browser console:

tinymce.activeEditor.ui.registry.getAll().contextMenus

The identifier below will add a context menu section containing one or more items. It is not possible to add individual items from the following context menu sections.

identifier Core/Plugin Description

image

Image

Adds the Image…​ item for opening the Insert/Edit Image dialog.

editimage

Enhanced Image Editing

Adds the Edit image item for opening the Edit Image dialog.

link

Link

Adds the Link…​ item for opening the Insert/Edit Link dialog.

linkchecker

Link Checker

Adds the Ignore item on links marked as broken, allowing the user to instruct linkchecker to ignore the link.

lists

Lists

Adds the List properties…​ item for opening the List Properties dialog.

configurepermanentpen

Permanent Pen

Adds the Permanent pen properties…​ item for opening the Permanent Pen Properties dialog when the permanent pen is in use.

spellchecker

Spell Checker

Adds a list suggested corrections, an Ignore item, and an Ignore all item.

table

Table

Adds table related context menu items, including Advanced Tables context menu items (if the Advanced Tables plugin is enabled).

For a list of available menu items that can be added to the context menu, see: Menu Items Available for TinyMCE.

Registering context menu sections

The structure of context menu sections is a simple query system indexed by name. We strongly recommend using the name of the plugin as the context menu name for ease of configuration.

In the menu shown to the user, sections are delineated by separators. Sections can return an empty array of menu items to indicate that section has no applicable items to the current context and should not be shown.

type ContextMenuApi = {
  update: (element: Element) => string | Array<ContextMenuContents>
}

editor.ui.registry.addContextMenu(name: string, feature: ContextMenuApi);

Every time the user opens the context menu, the selected element is passed to the update function which must return either a space separated string or an array of items to display. The types of the items returned are as follows:

type ContextMenuContents = string | ContextMenuItem | SeparatorMenuItemApi | ContextSubMenu

type ContextMenuItem = {
  type?: 'item';
  text: string;
  icon?: string;
  shortcut?: string;
  disabled?: boolean;
  onAction: () => void;
}
type ContextSubMenu = {
  type: 'submenu';
  text: string;
  icon?: string;
  shortcut?: string;
  disabled?: boolean;
  getSubmenuItems: () => string | Array<ContextMenuContents>;
}

type SeparatorMenuItemApi = {
  type: 'separator'
}

The most common type to use is string, which references an existing registered menu item.

ContextMenuItem, ContextSubMenu and SeparatorMenuItemApi types are intended for use by plugins with completely dynamic menu requirements, where registering each menu item is not necessary. For example, the spellchecker shows a list of suggestions specific to the selected word.

When creating a dynamic menu, the structure type properties are used in order to support untyped API usage:

  • type item (default) is a regular menu item, and must have an onAction method.

  • type submenu must have getSubmenuItems, and if it has an onAction property it is ignored.

  • type separator ignores all other properties.

Defining a context menu section

This example shows how the image plugin dynamically adds the standard image menu section to the context menu. The image context menu section is empty unless the selected element is an image.

  • TinyMCE

  • HTML

  • JS

  • Edit on CodePen

<textarea id="contextmenu-section">
  <p>Right click on the example image below will show the newly configured context menu.</p>

  <p><img style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" title="Tiny Logo" src="https://www.tiny.cloud/docs/images/logos/android-chrome-256x256.png" alt="TinyMCE Logo" width="128" height="128"></p>
  <p>Right Clicking on text should not invoke the context menu</p>
</textarea>
tinymce.PluginManager.add('my-example-plugin', (editor) => {
  editor.ui.registry.addMenuItem('image', {
    icon: 'image',
    text: 'Image',
    onAction: () => {
      console.log('context menu clicked');
      alert('context menu clicked');
    }
  });

  editor.ui.registry.addContextMenu('image', {
    update: (element) => !element.src ? '' : 'image'
  });
});

tinymce.init({
  selector: 'textarea#contextmenu-section',
  contextmenu: 'image',
  plugins: 'my-example-plugin',
  content_style: 'body { font-family:Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; font-size:16px }'
});