How to get selected option from Dropdown in jQuery ?

Last Updated : 15 May, 2023

In this article, we learn how to get the selected option from the dropdown list. This article requires some familiarity with HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and jQuery. We can solve this challenge by using the jQuery val() method.

The val() method in jQuery is used to set or return the value of an attribute for the selected elements. This method applies to the HTML form elements.

Syntax:

$(selector).val()   // or
$(selector).val(value)  // or
$(selector).val(function(index, current_value))

This method returns the selected element with specified changes made by val() method.

Example: In this example, we will select an option from the dropdown menu using jQuery.

HTML

<html>
<head>
    <title>
        How to get selected option from
        Dropdown list using jQuery?
    </title>
    <link href=
"https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/bootstrap@5.0.2/dist/css/bootstrap.min.css"
          rel="stylesheet"
          integrity=
"sha384-EVSTQN3/azprG1Anm3QDgpJLIm9Nao0Yz1ztcQTwFspd3yD65VohhpuuCOmLASjC"
          crossorigin="anonymous">
    <script src=
"https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/jquery/3.6.0/jquery.min.js">
    </script>
</head>
<body style="border: 2px solid green; min-height: 240px;">
    <div style="display: flex; justify-content: center;">
        <h1 style="color:green;">
            GeeksforGeeks
        </h1>
    </div>
    <select class="form-select mx-auto"
            aria-label="Default select example"
            style="width: 200px; margin-top: 20px;"
            id="lang">
        <option selected>Select Language</option>
        <option>C</option>
        <option>Java</option>
        <option>Python</option>
    </select>
 
    <div id="show" style="display: flex;
         justify-content: center; margin-top: 20px;">
    </div>
</body>
<script>
    $('#lang').on('input', function () {
        $('#show').text($('#lang').val());
    })
</script>
</html>