Check if a URL is an Image using JavaScript

Check if a URL is an Image in JavaScript #

To check if a url is an image, call the test() method on a regular expression that matches an image extension at the end of a string, e.g. .png or .jpg. The test() method will check if the url ends with an image extension and return true if it does.

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function isImage(url) {
  return /\.(jpg|jpeg|png|webp|avif|gif|svg)$/.test(url);
}

// 👇️ true
console.log(isImage('https://example.com/photo.jpg'));

// 👇️ true
console.log(isImage('https://example.com/photo.webp'));

// 👇️ false
console.log(isImage('https://example.com/index.html'));

We used the RegExp.test method to check if a regular expression is matched in a string.

The forward slashes / / mark the beginning and end of the regular expression.

The dot has to be escaped, because it has a special meaning in regular expression, therefore we escape it using a backslash \..

The parenthesis are called a capturing group and the pipe | symbol means - or.

The dollar sign $ matches the end of the input, in other words the string has to end in a .jpg extension.

This handles the edge case where the url might contain an image extension anywhere else.

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function isImage(url) {
  return /\.(jpg|jpeg|png|webp|avif|gif|svg)$/.test(url);
}

// 👇️ false
console.log(isImage('https://example.jpeg.com'));

If you ever need help reading a regular expression, check this regex cheatsheet from MDN out.

If you want to make the regular expression more strict, you can check if the string starts with https:// or http://.

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function isImage(url) {
  return /^https?:\/\/.+\.(jpg|jpeg|png|webp|avif|gif|svg)$/.test(url);
}

// 👇️ true
console.log(isImage('https://example.com/photo.jpg'));

// 👇️ true
console.log(isImage('https://example.com/photo.webp'));

// 👇️ false
console.log(isImage('https://example.com/index.html'));

The caret ^ matches the beginning of the input.

The string has to start with http or https.

The question mark ? matches the preceding item (the s character) zero or 1 times, in other words it makes it optional.

We used backslashes to escape the forward slashes that follow the https:// protocol.

The last thing we added is a dot and a plus. The dot . matches any single character and the plus + matches the preceding item one or more times.

This enables us to match any domain name.

In its entirety the regular expression matches strings that start with https?:// and end with a dot and an image extension.