How can you figure out the highest z-index in your document?

Question

In order to set a div containing a transparent text image as the highest z-index in my document, I picked the number 10,000 and it solved my problem.

Previously I had guessed with the number 3 but it had no effect.

So, is there a more scientific way of figuring out what z-index is higher than that of all of your other elements?

I tried looking for this metric in Firebug but couldn't find it.

Answer 1

You could call findHighestZIndex for a particular element type such as a 'DIV' like this:

findHighestZIndex('div');

assuming a findHighestZindex function that is defined like this:

function findHighestZIndex(elem)
{
  var elems = document.getElementsByTagName(elem);
  var highest = 0;
  for (var i = 0; i < elems.length; i++)
  {
    var zindex=document.defaultView.getComputedStyle(elems[i],null).getPropertyValue("z-index");
    if ((zindex > highest) && (zindex != 'auto'))
    {
      highest = zindex;
    }
  }
  return highest;
}

Answer 2

Stealing some code from abcoder site for the sake of clarity:

  var maxZ = Math.max.apply(null, 
    $.map($('body *'), function(e,n) {
      if ($(e).css('position') != 'static')
        return parseInt($(e).css('z-index')) || 1;
  }));

Answer 3

Using ES6 a cleaner approach

function maxZIndex() {

     return Array.from(document.querySelectorAll('body *'))
           .map(a => parseFloat(window.getComputedStyle(a).zIndex))
           .filter(a => !isNaN(a))
           .sort()
           .pop();
}

Answer 4

The best way to solve this problem is, in my opinion, just to set yourself conventions for what kinds of z-indexes are used for different kinds of elements. Then, you'll find the correct z-index to use by looking back at your documentation.

Answer 5

I believe what you are observing is Voodoo. Without access to your complete style sheet I can of course not tell reliably; but it strikes me as likely that what really has happened here is that you have forgotten that only positioned elements are affected by z-index.

Additionally, z-indexes aren't assigned automatically, only in style sheets, which means that with no other z-indexed elements, z-index:1; will be on top of everything else.

Answer 6

I guess you have to do this yourself ...

function findHighestZIndex()
{
    var divs = document.getElementsByTagName('div');
    var highest = 0;
    for (var i = 0; i < divs .length; i++)
    {
        var zindex = divs[i].style.zIndex;
        if (zindex > highest) {
            highest = zindex;
        }
    }
    return highest;
}

Answer 7

There isn't a default property or anything, but you could write some javascript to loop through all elements and figure it out. Or if you use a DOM management library like jQuery, you could extend its methods (or find out if it supports it already) so that it starts tracking element z-indices from page load, and then it becomes trivial to retrieve the highest z-index.

Answer 8

I’d like to add my ECMAScript 6 implementation that I use in one of my UserScripts. I’m using this one to define the z-index of specific elements so that they always appear the highest. I can exclude these elements with the chained :not selector.

let highestZIndex = 0;

// later, potentially repeatedly
highestZIndex = Math.max(
  highestZIndex,
  ...Array.from(document.querySelectorAll("body *:not([data-highest]):not(.yetHigher)"), (elem) => parseFloat(getComputedStyle(elem).zIndex))
    .filter((zIndex) => !isNaN(zIndex))
);

The lower five lines can run multiple times and update the variable highestZIndex repeatedly by finding out the maximum between the current highestZIndex value and all the other computed z-indices of all elements. The filter excludes all the "auto" values.

Answer 9

I had to do this for a project recently, and I found that I benefitted a lot from @Philippe Gerber's great answer here, and @flo's great answer (the accepted answer).

The key differences to the answers referenced above are:

• Both the CSS z-index, and any inline z-index style are calculated, and use the larger of the two for comparison and calculation.
• Values are coerced into integers, and any string values (auto, static, etc) are ignored.

Here is a CodePen for the code example, but it's included here as well.

(() => {
  /**
   * Determines is the value is numeric or not.
   * See: https://stackoverflow.com/a/9716488/1058612.
   * @param {*} val The value to test for numeric type.
   * @return {boolean} Whether the value is numeric or not.
   */
  function isNumeric(val) {
    return !isNaN(parseFloat(val)) && isFinite(val);
  }

  
  /**
   * Finds the highest index in the current document.
   * Derived from the following great examples:
   *  [1] https://stackoverflow.com/a/1118216/1058612
   *  [2] https://stackoverflow.com/a/1118217/1058612
   * @return {number} An integer representing the value of the highest z-index.
   */
  function findHighestZIndex() {
    let queryObject = document.querySelectorAll('*');
    let childNodes = Object.keys(queryObject).map(key => queryObject[key]);
    let highest = 0;
    
    childNodes.forEach((node) => {
      // Get the calculated CSS z-index value.
      let cssStyles = document.defaultView.getComputedStyle(node);
      let cssZIndex = cssStyles.getPropertyValue('z-index');
      
      // Get any inline z-index value.
      let inlineZIndex = node.style.zIndex;

      // Coerce the values as integers for comparison.
      cssZIndex = isNumeric(cssZIndex) ? parseInt(cssZIndex, 10) : 0;
      inlineZIndex = isNumeric(inlineZIndex) ? parseInt(inlineZIndex, 10) : 0;
      
      // Take the highest z-index for this element, whether inline or from CSS.
      let currentZIndex = cssZIndex > inlineZIndex ? cssZIndex : inlineZIndex;
      
      if ((currentZIndex > highest)) {
        highest = currentZIndex;
      }
    });

    return highest;
  }

  console.log('Highest Z', findHighestZIndex());
})();

#root {
  background-color: #333;
}

.first-child {
  background-color: #fff;
  display: inline-block;
  height: 100px;
  width: 100px;
}

.second-child {
  background-color: #00ff00;
  display: block;
  height: 90%;
  width: 90%;
  padding: 0;
  margin: 5%;
}

.third-child {
  background-color: #0000ff;
  display: block;
  height: 90%;
  width: 90%;
  padding: 0;
  margin: 5%;
}

.nested-high-z-index {
  position: absolute;
  z-index: 9999;
}

<div id="root" style="z-index: 10">
  <div class="first-child" style="z-index: 11">
    <div class="second-child" style="z-index: 12"></div>
  </div>
  <div class="first-child" style="z-index: 13">
    <div class="second-child" style="z-index: 14"></div>
  </div>
  <div class="first-child" style="z-index: 15">
    <div class="second-child" style="z-index: 16"></div>
  </div>
  <div class="first-child" style="z-index: 17">
    <div class="second-child" style="z-index: 18">
      <div class="third-child" style="z-index: 19">
        <div class="nested-high-z-index">Hello!!! </div>
      </div>
    </div>
  </div>
  <div class="first-child">
    <div class="second-child"></div>
  </div>
  <div class="first-child">
    <div class="second-child"></div>
  </div>
  <div class="first-child">
    <div class="second-child"></div>
  </div>
</div>

Answer 10

Using jQuery:

if no elements supplied, it checks all elements.

function maxZIndex(elems)
{
    var maxIndex = 0;
    elems = typeof elems !== 'undefined' ? elems : $("*");

    $(elems).each(function(){
                      maxIndex = (parseInt(maxIndex) < parseInt($(this).css('z-index'))) ? parseInt($(this).css('z-index')) : maxIndex;
                      });

return maxIndex;
}

Answer 11

If you're looking to show the IDs of all elements with the highest z indices:

function show_highest_z() {
    z_inds = []
    ids = []
    res = []
    $.map($('body *'), function(e, n) {
        if ($(e).css('position') != 'static') {
            z_inds.push(parseFloat($(e).css('z-index')) || 1)
            ids.push($(e).attr('id'))
        }
    })
    max_z = Math.max.apply(null, z_inds)
    for (i = 0; i < z_inds.length; i++) {
        if (z_inds[i] == max_z) {
            inner = {}
            inner.id = ids[i]
            inner.z_index = z_inds[i]
            res.push(inner)
        }
    }
    return (res)
}

Usage:

show_highest_z()

Result:

[{
    "id": "overlay_LlI4wrVtcuBcSof",
    "z_index": 999999
}, {
    "id": "overlay_IZ2l6piwCNpKxAH",
    "z_index": 999999
}]

Answer 12

A solution highly inspired from the excellent idea of @Rajkeshwar Prasad .

	/**
	returns highest z-index
	@param {HTMLElement} [target] highest z-index applyed to target if it is an HTMLElement.
	@return {number} the highest z-index.
	*/
	var maxZIndex=function(target) {
	    if(target instanceof HTMLElement){
	        return (target.style.zIndex=maxZIndex()+1);
	    }else{
	        var zi,tmp=Array.from(document.querySelectorAll('body *'))
	            .map(a => parseFloat(window.getComputedStyle(a).zIndex));
	        zi=tmp.length;
	        tmp=tmp.filter(a => !isNaN(a));
	        return tmp.length?Math.max(tmp.sort((a,b) => a-b).pop(),zi):zi;
	    }
	};

#layer_1,#layer_2,#layer_3{
  position:absolute;
  border:solid 1px #000;
  width:100px;
  height:100px;
}
#layer_1{
  left:10px;
  top:10px;
  background-color:#f00;
}
#layer_2{
  left:60px;
  top:20px;
  background-color:#0f0;
  z-index:150;
}
#layer_3{
  left:20px;
  top:60px;
  background-color:#00f;
}

<div id="layer_1" onclick="maxZIndex(this)">layer_1</div>
<div id="layer_2" onclick="maxZIndex(this)">layer_2</div>
<div id="layer_3" onclick="maxZIndex(this)">layer_3</div>

Answer 13

Array.reduce()

Here's another solution to determine the topmost z-index that uses Array.reduce():

const max_zindex = [...document.querySelectorAll('body *')].reduce((accumulator, current_value) => {
  current_value = +getComputedStyle(current_value).zIndex;

  if (current_value === current_value) { // Not NaN
    return Math.max(accumulator, current_value)
  }

  return accumulator;
}, 0); // Default Z-Index Rendering Layer 0 (Zero)

Answer 14

Consider this code which you can use as a library: getMaxZIndex