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Jsoup Java Html Parser Tutorial with Examples

  1. What is Jsoup?
  2. Jsoup Library
  3. Jsoup API
  4. Manipulating Document
  5. DOM Methods
  6. The methods similar to jQuery,Css

1. What is Jsoup?

Jsoup is a java html parser. It is a java library that is used to parse HTML document. Jsoup provides api to extract and manipulate data from URL or HTML file. It uses DOM, CSS and Jquery-like methods for extracting and manipulating file.
Let's look at an example with Jsoup:
HelloJsoup.java
import java.io.IOException;  
import org.jsoup.Jsoup;  
import org.jsoup.nodes.Document;

public class HelloJsoup {  
   public static void main( String[] args ) throws IOException{  
       Document doc = Jsoup.connect("http://eclipse.org").get();  
       String title = doc.title();  
       System.out.println("Title : " + title);  
   }  
}

2. Jsoup Library

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You can use Maven or download the Jsoup library.
Using maven:
<!-- http://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.jsoup/jsoup -->
<dependency>
   <groupId>org.jsoup</groupId>
   <artifactId>jsoup</artifactId>
   <version>1.8.3</version>
</dependency>
Or download:

3. Jsoup API

Jsoup includes many classes, however, its three most important classes are:
  • org.jsoup.Jsoup
  • org.jsoup.nodes.Document
  • org.jsoup.nodes.Element
  • Jsoup.java
Method
Description
static Connection connect(String url)
create and returns connection of URL.
static Document parse(File in, String charsetName)
parses the specified charset file into document.
static Document parse(File in, String charsetName, String baseUri)
parses the specified charset and baseUri file into Document.
static Document parse(String html)
parses the given html code into document.
static Document parse(String html, String baseUri)
parses the given html code with baseUri into Document.
static Document parse(URL url, int timeoutMillis)
parses the given URL into Document.
static String clean(String bodyHtml, Whitelist whitelist)
returns safe HTML from input HTML, by parsing input HTML and filtering it through a white-list of permitted tags and attributes.
  • Document.java
Methods
Description
Element body()
Accessor to the document's body element.
Charset charset()
Returns the charset used in this document.
void charset(Charset charset)
Sets the charset used in this document.
Document clone()
Create a stand-alone, deep copy of this node, and all of its children.
Element createElement(String tagName)
Create a new Element, with this document's base uri.
static Document createShell(String baseUri)
Create a valid, empty shell of a document, suitable for adding more elements to.
Element head()
Accessor to the document's head element.
String location()
Get the URL this Document was parsed from.
String nodeName()
Get the node name of this node.
Document normalise()
Normalise the document.
String outerHtml()
Get the outer HTML of this node.
Document.OutputSettings outputSettings()
Get the document's current output settings.
Document outputSettings(Document.OutputSettings outputSettings)
Set the document's output settings.
Document.QuirksMode quirksMode()
Document quirksMode(Document.QuirksMode quirksMode)
Element text(String text)
Set the text of the body of this document.
String title()
Get the string contents of the document's title element.
void title(String title)
Set the document's title element.
boolean updateMetaCharsetElement()
Returns whether the element with charset information in this document is updated on changes through Document.charset(Charset) or not.
void updateMetaCharsetElement(boolean update)
Sets whether the element with charset information in this document is updated on changes through Document.charset(Charset) or not.
  • Element.java

4. Manipulating Document

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Create Documet from URL
GetDocumentFromURL.java
package org.o7planning.tutorial.jsoup.document;

import java.io.IOException;
import org.jsoup.Jsoup;
import org.jsoup.nodes.Document;

public class GetDocumentFromURL {
  public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
      Document doc = Jsoup.connect("http://eclipse.org").get();
      String title = doc.title();
      System.out.println("Title : " + title);
  }
}
Running example:
Create Document from File
GetDocumentFromFile.java
package org.o7planning.tutorial.jsoup.document;

import java.io.File;
import java.io.IOException;
import org.jsoup.Jsoup;
import org.jsoup.nodes.Document;

public class GetDocumentFromFile {
   public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
       File htmlFile = new File("C:/index.html");
       Document doc = Jsoup.parse(htmlFile, "UTF-8");
       String title = doc.title();
       System.out.println("Title : " + title);
   }
}
Create Document from String
GetDocumentFromString.java
package org.o7planning.tutorial.jsoup.document;

import java.io.IOException;
import org.jsoup.Jsoup;
import org.jsoup.nodes.Document;

public class GetDocumentFromString {
  public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
      String htmlString = "<html><head><title>Simple Page</title></head>"
                         + "<body>Hello</body></html>";
      Document doc = Jsoup.parse(htmlString);
      String title = doc.title();
      System.out.println("Title : " + title);
      System.out.println("Content:\n");
      System.out.println(doc.toString());
  }
}
Running example:
Parsing HTML Fragment
A full HTML document includes Header and Body, sometimes you also need to parse an HTML fragment. And you can get a full HTML document includes headers and body. See for example:
ParsingBodyFragment.java
package org.o7planning.tutorial.jsoup.document;

import java.io.IOException;
import org.jsoup.Jsoup;
import org.jsoup.nodes.Document;

public class ParsingBodyFragment {
  public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
      String htmlFragment = "<h1>Hi you!</h1><p>What is this?</p>";
      Document doc = Jsoup.parseBodyFragment(htmlFragment);
      String fullHtml = doc.html();
      System.out.println(fullHtml);
  }
}
Running example:

5. DOM Methods

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Jsoup has some methods similar to the method in the DOM model ( Parsing XML document)
Methods
Description
Element getElementById(String id)
Find an element by ID, including or under this element.
Elements getElementsByTag(String tag)
Finds elements, including and recursively under this element, with the specified tag name.
Elements getElementsByClass(String className)
Find elements that have this class, including or under this element.
Elements getElementsByAttribute(String key)
Find elements that have a named attribute set. Case insensitive.
Elements siblingElements()
Get sibling elements.
Element firstElementSibling()
Gets the first element sibling of this element.
Element lastElementSibling()
Gets the last element sibling of this element.
......
The method of retrieving data of Element.
Method
Description
String attr(String key)
Get an attribute's value by its key.
void attr(String key, String value)
Set an attribute. If the attribute already exists, it is replaced.
String id()
Return The id attribute, if present, or an empty string if not.
String className()
Gets the literal value of this element's "class" attribute, which may include multiple class names, space separated. (E.g. on <div class="header gray"> returns, " header gray")
Set<String> classNames()
Get all of the element's class names. E.g. on element <div class="header gray">, returns a set of two elements "header", "gray". Note that modifications to this set are not pushed to the backing class attribute; use the classNames(java.util.Set) method to persist them.
String text()
Gets the combined text of this element and all its children.
void text(String value)
Set the text of this element.
String html()
Retrieves the element's inner HTML. E.g. on a <div><p>a</p></div>, would return <p>a</p>. (Whereas Node.outerHtml() would return <div><p>a</p></div>.)
void html(String value)
Set this element's inner HTML. Clears the existing HTML first.
Tag tag()
Get the Tag for this element
String tagName()
Get the name of the tag for this element. E.g. div
......
The methods to manipulate HTML:
Methods
Description
Element append(String html)
Add inner HTML to this element. The supplied HTML will be parsed, and each node appended to the end of the children.
Element prepend(String html)
Add inner HTML into this element. The supplied HTML will be parsed, and each node prepended to the start of the element's children.
Element appendText(String text)
Create and append a new TextNode to this element.
Element prependText(String text)
Create and prepend a new TextNode to this element.
Element appendElement(String tagName)
Create a new element by tag name, and add it as the last child.
Element prependElement(String tagName)
Create a new element by tag name, and add it as the first child.
Element html(String value)
Set this element's inner HTML. Clears the existing HTML first.
......
For example, using the DOM methods, parsing an HTML document and retrieve information of form tag.
register.html
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8">
<title>Register</title>
</head>
<body>
   <form id="registerForm" action="doRegister" method="post">
       <table>
           <tr>
               <td>User Name</td>
               <td><input type="text" name="userName" value="Tom" /></td>
           </tr>
           <tr>
               <td>Password</td>
               <td><input type="password" name="password" value="Tom001" /></td>
           </tr>
           <tr>
               <td>Email</td>
               <td><input type="email" name="email" value="theEmail@gmail.com" /></td>
           </tr>
           <tr>
               <td colspan="2"><input type="submit" name="submit" value="Submit" /></td>
           </tr>
       </table>
   </form>
</body>
</html>
ReadHtmlForm.java
package org.o7planning.tutorial.jsoup.dom;

import java.io.File;
import java.io.IOException;
import org.jsoup.Jsoup;
import org.jsoup.nodes.Document;
import org.jsoup.nodes.Element;
import org.jsoup.select.Elements;

public class ReadHtmlForm {
   public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
       Document doc = Jsoup.parse(new File("files/register.html"), "utf-8");
       Element form = doc.getElementById("registerForm");
       System.out.println("Form action = "+ form.attr("action"));
       Elements inputElements = form.getElementsByTag("input");
       for (Element inputElement : inputElements) {
           String key = inputElement.attr("name");
           String value = inputElement.attr("value");
           System.out.println(key + " =  " + value);
       }
   }
}
Running example:
GetAllLinks.java
package org.o7planning.tutorial.jsoup.dom;

import java.io.IOException;
import org.jsoup.Jsoup;
import org.jsoup.nodes.Document;
import org.jsoup.nodes.Element;
import org.jsoup.select.Elements;

public class GetAllLinks {
   public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
       Document doc = Jsoup.connect("http://o7planning.org").get();
       // Elements extends ArrayList<Element>.
       Elements aElements = doc.getElementsByTag("a");
       for (Element aElement : aElements) {
           String href = aElement.attr("href");
           String text = aElement.text();
           System.out.println(text);
           System.out.println("\t" + href);
       }
   }
}
Running example:

6. The methods similar to jQuery,Css

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You want to find or manipulate elements using a CSS or jquery-like selector syntax?
JSoup give you a few methods to do this:
  • Element.select(String selector)
  • Elements.select(String selector)
Example:
Connection conn = Jsoup.connect("http://o7planning.org");
        
Document doc = conn.get();

// a with href
Elements links = doc.select("a[href]");

// img with src ending .png
Elements pngs = doc.select("img[src$=.png]");

// div with class=masthead
Element masthead = doc.select("div.masthead").first();

// direct a after h3
Elements resultLinks = doc.select("h3.r > a");
Jsoup elements support a CSS (or jquery) like selector syntax to find matching elements, that allows very powerful and robust queries.

The select method is available in a Document, Element, or in Elements. It is contextual, so you can filter by selecting from a specific element, or by chaining select calls.

Select returns a list of Elements (as Elements), which provides a range of methods to extract and manipulate the results.
Selector overview
Selector
Description
tagname
find elements by tag, e.g. a
ns|tag
find elements by tag in a namespace, e.g. fb|name finds <fb:name> elements
#id
find elements by ID, e.g. #logo
.class:
find elements by class name, e.g. .masthead
[attribute]
elements with attribute, e.g. [href]
[^attr]
elements with an attribute name prefix, e.g. [^data-] finds elements with HTML5 dataset attributes
[attr=value]
elements with attribute value, e.g. [width=500] (also quotable, like sequence")
[attr^=value], [attr$=value], [attr*=value]
elements with attributes that start with, end with, or contain the value, e.g. [href*=/path/]
[attr~=regex]
elements with attribute values that match the regular expression; e.g. img[src~=(?i)\.(png|jpe?g)]
*
all elements, e.g. *
Selector combinations
Selector
Description
el#id
elements with ID, e.g. div#logo
el.class
elements with class, e.g. div.masthead
el[attr]
elements with attribute, e.g. a[href]
Any combination, e.g. a[href].highlight
ancestor child
child elements that descend from ancestor, e.g. .body p finds p elements anywhere under a block with class "body"
parent > child
child elements that descend directly from parent, e.g. div.content > p finds p elements; and body > * finds the direct children of the body tag
siblingA + siblingB
finds sibling B element immediately preceded by sibling A, e.g. div.head + div
siblingA ~ siblingX
finds sibling X element preceded by sibling A, e.g. h1 ~ p
el, el, el
group multiple selectors, find elements that match any of the selectors; e.g. div.masthead, div.logo
Pseudo selectors
Selector
Description
:lt(n)
find elements whose sibling index (i.e. its position in the DOM tree relative to its parent) is less than n; e.g. td:lt(3)
:gt(n)
find elements whose sibling index is greater than n; e.g. div p:gt(2)
:eq(n)
find elements whose sibling index is equal to n; e.g. form input:eq(1)
:has(seletor)
find elements that contain elements matching the selector; e.g. div:has(p)
:not(selector)
find elements that do not match the selector; e.g. div:not(.logo)
:contains(text)
find elements that contain the given text. The search is case-insensitive; e.g. p:contains(jsoup)
:containsOwn(text)
find elements that directly contain the given text
:matches(regex)
find elements whose text matches the specified regular expression; e.g. div:matches((?i)login)
:matchesOwn(regex)
find elements whose own text matches the specified regular expression
Note that the above indexed pseudo-selectors are 0-based, that is, the first element is at index 0, the second at 1, et
QueryLinks.java
package org.o7planning.tutorial.jsoup.selector;

import java.io.IOException;
import java.util.Iterator;
import org.jsoup.Connection;
import org.jsoup.Jsoup;
import org.jsoup.nodes.Document;
import org.jsoup.nodes.Element;
import org.jsoup.select.Elements;

public class QueryLinks {
    public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
        Connection conn = Jsoup.connect("http://o7planning.org");
        Document doc = conn.get();
        // Query <a> elements, href contain /document/
        String cssQuery = "a[href*=/document/]";
        Elements elements=    doc.select(cssQuery);
        Iterator<Element> iterator = elements.iterator();
        
        while(iterator.hasNext())  {
            Element e = iterator.next();
            System.out.println(e.attr("href"));
        }
    }
}
Results:
document.html
<html>
<head>
<title>Jsoup Example</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>Java Tutorial For Beginners</h1>
<br>
<div id="content">
   Content ....
</div>
<div class="related-container">
    <h3>Related Documents</h3>
    <a href="http://o7planning.org/web/fe/default/en/document/649342/guide-to-installing-and-configuring-eclipse">
       Guide to Installing and Configuring Eclipse
    </a>
    <a href="http://o7planning.org/web/fe/default/en/document/649326/guide-to-installing-and-configuring-java">
       Guide to Installing and Configuring Java  
    </a>
    <a href="http://o7planning.org/web/fe/default/en/document/245310/jdk-javadoc-in-chm-format">
       Jdk Javadoc in chm format
    </a>
</div>
</body>
</html>
SelectorDemo1.java
package org.o7planning.tutorial.jsoup.selector;

import java.io.File;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.util.Iterator;
import org.jsoup.Jsoup;
import org.jsoup.nodes.Document;
import org.jsoup.nodes.Element;
import org.jsoup.select.Elements;

public class SelectorDemo1 {
    public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
        File htmlFile = new File("document.html");
        Document doc = Jsoup.parse(htmlFile, "UTF-8");
        // First <div> element has class ="related-container"
        Element div = doc.select("div.related-container").first();
        // List the <h3>, the direct child elements of the current element.
        Elements h3Elements = div.select("> h3");
        // Get first <h3> element
        Element h3 = h3Elements.first();
        System.out.println(h3.text());
        // List <a> elements, is a descendant of the current element
        Elements aElements = div.select("a");
        // Query the current element list.
        // The element that href contains 'installing'.
        Elements aEclipses = aElements.select("[href*=Installing]");
        Iterator<Element> iterator = aEclipses.iterator();

        while (iterator.hasNext()) {
            Element a = iterator.next();
            System.out.println("Document: "+ a.text());
        }
    }
}
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