Detect Desktop Browser (not mobile) with Javascript

Question

I found the following code to detect a desktop browser. But the method also detects some mobile browsers. How can I detect only desktop browsers like Safari, IE, Firefox, Opera etc?

is_desktopBrowser : function() {
    var ua = navigator.userAgent.toLowerCase();

    var rwebkit = /(webkit)[ \/]([\w.]+)/;
    var ropera = /(opera)(?:.*version)?[ \/]([\w.]+)/;
    var rmsie = /(msie) ([\w.]+)/;
    var rmozilla = /(mozilla)(?:.*? rv:([\w.]+))?/;

    var match = rwebkit.exec(ua) ||
            ropera.exec(ua) ||
            rmsie.exec(ua) ||
            ua.indexOf("compatible") < 0 && rmozilla.exec(ua) ||
            [];

    return { browser: match[1] || "", version: match[2] || "0" };
},

Answer 1

jQuery.browser can be helpful when trying to figure out which browser. jQuery.browser was removed in jQuery 1.9.

I believe it is based on navigator.UserAgent, however navigator.UserAgent can tell you the OS on its own if you want.

Try this:

var isMobile = navigator.userAgent.match(/(iPad)|(iPhone)|(iPod)|(android)|(webOS)/i)

source

Answer 2

I check for

('ontouchstart' in window)

since that will tell me if I'm on a touch capable device. Of course that also returns true for an ipad, which might not be considered a "mobile device", but then I just check window.width for layout purposes.

Answer 3

I came up with this:

    var isTouchDevice = function() {  return 'ontouchstart' in window || 'onmsgesturechange' in window; };
    var isDesktop = window.screenX != 0 && !isTouchDevice() ? true : false;

It leverages two things we can hold on to. One, window.screenX will ALWAYS be 0 on any tablet / mobile device. You can't move windows on these devices, it is always full screen.

Two, isTouchDevice is a pretty reliable way to know if it's mobile (android / iphone tablet) or Windows Surfacey thing. It has a touch event. Combining the two gives us a high degree of certainty that it's a mobile or tablet. If you're not one of those, you must be desktop.

Yes, you might have a desktop that somehow reports itself as touch and has the browser maxxed to the upper left. In my case, I can let that go.

Answer 4

I have been investigating this for my ReView (Responsive Viewport) project. I use a combination of the following.

• window.screenX

Most mobile browsers have the 'window' locked to the left hand side. So if this isn't zero, likely to be a desktop browser window.

• window.devicePixelRatio and screen.width

If dpr is 1 and screen width is reported as large via screen.width, likely to be desktop.

• window.orientation

It is rare to find a desktop monitor in portrait mode. However, this could happen.

More unlikely is multiple orientation changes while using your site/app. This implies a desktop user would be spinning their screen... very unlikely.

A combination of these with some common sense and you can achieve a pretty solid guess.

The project mentioned along with more info is at http://responsiveviewport.com

Hope that helps.

Answer 5

Even it's a bit overkill for your case, express-useragent is one of the best solution as it can be used on both server and browser. Your case:

Include js file in HTML

<script type="text/javascript" src="/path/to/express-useragent.js"></script>

Execute the plugin

var userAgent = new UserAgent().parse(navigator.userAgent);

Value of userAgent will be something like

{
  "isMobile":false,
  "isDesktop":true,
  "isBot":false,
  .....
  "browser":"Chrome",
  "version":"17.0.963.79",
  "os":"Windows 7",
  "platform":"Microsoft Windows",
  "source":"Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64) AppleWebKit/535.11 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/17.0.963.79..."
}

Answer 6

You can go to http://detectmobilebrowsers.com and generate a JS script which will detect whether a browser is a mobile browser. Unless you are worried about Smart TVs or some other non mobile nor desktop appliances, you can use that script and assume that if the browser is NOT a mobile browser then it should be a desktop browser.

Here is an example solution using the regex-es generated by that site:

var ua = navigator.userAgent.toLowerCase();
var isDesktop = !(/(android|bb\d+|meego).+mobile|avantgo|bada\/|blackberry|blazer|compal|elaine|fennec|hiptop|iemobile|ip(hone|od)|iris|kindle|lge |maemo|midp|mmp|netfront|opera m(ob|in)i|palm( os)?|phone|p(ixi|re)\/|plucker|pocket|psp|series(4|6)0|symbian|treo|up\.(browser|link)|vodafone|wap|windows (ce|phone)|xda|xiino/i.test(a)||/1207|6310|6590|3gso|4thp|50[1-6]i|770s|802s|a wa|abac|ac(er|oo|s\-)|ai(ko|rn)|al(av|ca|co)|amoi|an(ex|ny|yw)|aptu|ar(ch|go)|as(te|us)|attw|au(di|\-m|r |s )|avan|be(ck|ll|nq)|bi(lb|rd)|bl(ac|az)|br(e|v)w|bumb|bw\-(n|u)|c55\/|capi|ccwa|cdm\-|cell|chtm|cldc|cmd\-|co(mp|nd)|craw|da(it|ll|ng)|dbte|dc\-s|devi|dica|dmob|do(c|p)o|ds(12|\-d)|el(49|ai)|em(l2|ul)|er(ic|k0)|esl8|ez([4-7]0|os|wa|ze)|fetc|fly(\-|_)|g1 u|g560|gene|gf\-5|g\-mo|go(\.w|od)|gr(ad|un)|haie|hcit|hd\-(m|p|t)|hei\-|hi(pt|ta)|hp( i|ip)|hs\-c|ht(c(\-| |_|a|g|p|s|t)|tp)|hu(aw|tc)|i\-(20|go|ma)|i230|iac( |\-|\/)|ibro|idea|ig01|ikom|im1k|inno|ipaq|iris|ja(t|v)a|jbro|jemu|jigs|kddi|keji|kgt( |\/)|klon|kpt |kwc\-|kyo(c|k)|le(no|xi)|lg( g|\/(k|l|u)|50|54|\-[a-w])|libw|lynx|m1\-w|m3ga|m50\/|ma(te|ui|xo)|mc(01|21|ca)|m\-cr|me(rc|ri)|mi(o8|oa|ts)|mmef|mo(01|02|bi|de|do|t(\-| |o|v)|zz)|mt(50|p1|v )|mwbp|mywa|n10[0-2]|n20[2-3]|n30(0|2)|n50(0|2|5)|n7(0(0|1)|10)|ne((c|m)\-|on|tf|wf|wg|wt)|nok(6|i)|nzph|o2im|op(ti|wv)|oran|owg1|p800|pan(a|d|t)|pdxg|pg(13|\-([1-8]|c))|phil|pire|pl(ay|uc)|pn\-2|po(ck|rt|se)|prox|psio|pt\-g|qa\-a|qc(07|12|21|32|60|\-[2-7]|i\-)|qtek|r380|r600|raks|rim9|ro(ve|zo)|s55\/|sa(ge|ma|mm|ms|ny|va)|sc(01|h\-|oo|p\-)|sdk\/|se(c(\-|0|1)|47|mc|nd|ri)|sgh\-|shar|sie(\-|m)|sk\-0|sl(45|id)|sm(al|ar|b3|it|t5)|so(ft|ny)|sp(01|h\-|v\-|v )|sy(01|mb)|t2(18|50)|t6(00|10|18)|ta(gt|lk)|tcl\-|tdg\-|tel(i|m)|tim\-|t\-mo|to(pl|sh)|ts(70|m\-|m3|m5)|tx\-9|up(\.b|g1|si)|utst|v400|v750|veri|vi(rg|te)|vk(40|5[0-3]|\-v)|vm40|voda|vulc|vx(52|53|60|61|70|80|81|83|85|98)|w3c(\-| )|webc|whit|wi(g |nc|nw)|wmlb|wonu|x700|yas\-|your|zeto|zte\-/i.test(a.substr(0,4)));

Answer 7

只需包含Modernizr js 文件，它就会向所有桌面浏览器添加名为 no-touch 的类，以便您可以轻松地使用这些类进行定位

Answer 8

Actually, it is easy to detect mobile or tablet device, then with a simple result inversion we can understand that is desktop or not, for easy accessing I write a simple function:

const isDesktop = () => {
  const navigatorAgent =
    navigator.userAgent || navigator.vendor || window.opera;
  return !(
    /(android|bb\d+|meego).+mobile|avantgo|bada\/|blackberry|blazer|compal|elaine|fennec|hiptop|iemobile|ip(hone|od)|iris|kindle|lge |maemo|midp|mmp|mobile.+firefox|netfront|opera m(ob|in)i|palm( os)?|phone|p(ixi|re)\/|plucker|pocket|psp|series([46])0|symbian|treo|up\.(browser|link)|vodafone|wap|windows ce|xda|xiino|android|ipad|playbook|silk/i.test(
      navigatorAgent
    ) ||
    /1207|6310|6590|3gso|4thp|50[1-6]i|770s|802s|a wa|abac|ac(er|oo|s-)|ai(ko|rn)|al(av|ca|co)|amoi|an(ex|ny|yw)|aptu|ar(ch|go)|as(te|us)|attw|au(di|-m|r |s )|avan|be(ck|ll|nq)|bi(lb|rd)|bl(ac|az)|br([ev])w|bumb|bw-([nu])|c55\/|capi|ccwa|cdm-|cell|chtm|cldc|cmd-|co(mp|nd)|craw|da(it|ll|ng)|dbte|dc-s|devi|dica|dmob|do([cp])o|ds(12|-d)|el(49|ai)|em(l2|ul)|er(ic|k0)|esl8|ez([4-7]0|os|wa|ze)|fetc|fly([-_])|g1 u|g560|gene|gf-5|g-mo|go(\.w|od)|gr(ad|un)|haie|hcit|hd-([mpt])|hei-|hi(pt|ta)|hp( i|ip)|hs-c|ht(c([- _agpst])|tp)|hu(aw|tc)|i-(20|go|ma)|i230|iac([ \-/])|ibro|idea|ig01|ikom|im1k|inno|ipaq|iris|ja([tv])a|jbro|jemu|jigs|kddi|keji|kgt([ /])|klon|kpt |kwc-|kyo([ck])|le(no|xi)|lg( g|\/([klu])|50|54|-[a-w])|libw|lynx|m1-w|m3ga|m50\/|ma(te|ui|xo)|mc(01|21|ca)|m-cr|me(rc|ri)|mi(o8|oa|ts)|mmef|mo(01|02|bi|de|do|t([- ov])|zz)|mt(50|p1|v )|mwbp|mywa|n10[0-2]|n20[2-3]|n30([02])|n50([025])|n7(0([01])|10)|ne(([cm])-|on|tf|wf|wg|wt)|nok([6i])|nzph|o2im|op(ti|wv)|oran|owg1|p800|pan([adt])|pdxg|pg(13|-([1-8]|c))|phil|pire|pl(ay|uc)|pn-2|po(ck|rt|se)|prox|psio|pt-g|qa-a|qc(07|12|21|32|60|-[2-7]|i-)|qtek|r380|r600|raks|rim9|ro(ve|zo)|s55\/|sa(ge|ma|mm|ms|ny|va)|sc(01|h-|oo|p-)|sdk\/|se(c([-01])|47|mc|nd|ri)|sgh-|shar|sie([-m])|sk-0|sl(45|id)|sm(al|ar|b3|it|t5)|so(ft|ny)|sp(01|h-|v-|v )|sy(01|mb)|t2(18|50)|t6(00|10|18)|ta(gt|lk)|tcl-|tdg-|tel([im])|tim-|t-mo|to(pl|sh)|ts(70|m-|m3|m5)|tx-9|up(\.b|g1|si)|utst|v400|v750|veri|vi(rg|te)|vk(40|5[0-3]|-v)|vm40|voda|vulc|vx(52|53|60|61|70|80|81|83|85|98)|w3c([- ])|webc|whit|wi(g |nc|nw)|wmlb|wonu|x700|yas-|your|zeto|zte-/i.test(
      navigatorAgent.substr(0, 4)
    )
  );
};

Note : this function is based on ES6 and it should transpile, best case for ReactJS .

Answer 9

The problem with your script is, that it's just trying to detect the browser with the UserAgent -string which is not quite accurate because everyone can fake his UserAgent .

For a pretty good read on browser detection, check out this link: http://www.quirksmode.org/js/detect.html

Answer 10

As I said here , IE10+ solution just using matchMedia :

const isMobile = () => window.matchMedia('(max-width: 700px)').matches

isMobile() returns a boolean

 const isMobile = () => window.matchMedia('(max-width: 700px)').matches document.addEventListener('DOMContentLoaded', () => { setInterval(() => document.querySelector('.result').textContent = isMobile() ? 'yes but you should try this code in a bigger screen' : 'no', 300) }, false);

 .result { color: green; font-weight: bold; }

 Am I on mobile screen? <span class="result">something went wrong :/</span> <p> <div>Click in full page to see the difference</div>

Answer 11

What is the specific feature of a desktop browser that means you want different behaviour?

Is it the input mechanism (mouse and physical keyboard vs touch and virtual keyboard), the larger screen size, or something else?

For example, in CSS4 you can use @media (any-pointer: coarse) for touch-enabled devices and@media (pointer: coarse) for devices where the primary input is touch (ie phones and tablets whether or not an external keyboard is plugged in). CSS4 is mostly fully supported by modern browsers.

In JavaScript, you can use Window.matchMedia() to test for any CSS media query (including those above) as suggested in this SO answer . (I would have hoped for something more native by now, but couldn't find anything.)

Answer 12

would this not work?

window.addEventListener('mousemove', function(){
    // whatever code you want to have on desktop
});