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GeezerVison is showing developer.mozilla.org — HTMLAnchorElement: referrerPolicy property - Web APIs | MDN

HTMLAnchorElement: referrerPolicy property

Baseline
Widely available
*

This feature is well established and works across many devices and browser versions. It’s been available across browsers since September 2020.

* Some parts of this feature may have varying levels of support.

  • See full compatibility
  • Learn more

The HTMLAnchorElement.referrerPolicy property reflect the HTML referrerpolicy attribute of the <a> element defining which referrer is sent when fetching the resource.

Value

A string; one of the following:

no-referrer

The Referer header will be omitted entirely. No referrer information is sent along with requests.

no-referrer-when-downgrade

The URL is sent as a referrer when the protocol security level stays the same (e.g.HTTP→HTTP, HTTPS→HTTPS), but isn't sent to a less secure destination (e.g., HTTPS→HTTP).

origin

Only send the origin of the document as the referrer in all cases. The document https://example.com/page.html will send the referrer https://example.com/.

origin-when-cross-origin

Send a full URL when performing a same-origin request, but only send the origin of the document for other cases.

same-origin

A referrer will be sent for same-site origins, but cross-origin requests will contain no referrer information.

strict-origin

Only send the origin of the document as the referrer when the protocol security level stays the same (e.g., HTTPS→HTTPS), but don't send it to a less secure destination (e.g., HTTPS→HTTP).

strict-origin-when-cross-origin (default)

This is the user agent's default behavior if no policy is specified. Send a full URL when performing a same-origin request, only send the origin when the protocol security level stays the same (e.g., HTTPS→HTTPS), and send no header to a less secure destination (e.g., HTTPS→HTTP).

unsafe-url

Send a full URL when performing a same-origin or cross-origin request. This policy will leak origins and paths from TLS-protected resources to insecure origins. Carefully consider the impact of this setting.

Examples

js
const elt = document.createElement("a");
const linkText = document.createTextNode("My link");
elt.appendChild(linkText);
elt.href = "https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/";
elt.referrerPolicy = "no-referrer";

const div = document.getElementById("divAround");
div.appendChild(elt); // When clicked, the link will not send a referrer header.

Specifications

Specification
HTML
# dom-a-referrerpolicy

Browser compatibility

See also

  • HTMLImageElement.referrerPolicy, HTMLAreaElement.referrerPolicy, and HTMLIFrameElement.referrerPolicy.

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This page was last modified on Nov 30, 2025 by MDN contributors.

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