React Link Parser

A tiny React component (~1KB) that parses plain text into links, emails or renders elements that start or end with a specific character or word in the way you want.

How it works?

Iterates over every word in the given string and matches watchers to render it customized with matched watcher render function.

Install

Install the react-link-parser package with npm or yarn:

npm install react-link-parser

yarn add react-link-parser

Get started

Let's start using the component with a couple of practical examples.

A simple example

As a common use case, let's say you want to identify links in your text and render them with your custom render component.
This is the default behavior of the component, so all you need to do is import the package and start using it in your React application.

import LinkParser from "react-link-parser";

export function App() {
  return (
    <LinkParser>
      I know you will forgive me for it. Were not my other associations so chosen by Fate as to make a heart like mine
      uneasy? Read more here: https://lorem.ipsum/book
    </LinkParser>
  );
}

Parse tags, mentions and more

In cases where you want to customize how certain words or characters are rendered, you can define a list of watchers that specify which words or characters to target and which function to use for rendering. With this functionality, you can easily create a more personalized parser.

import LinkParser from "react-link-parser";

export function App() {
  // a list of watchers
  const watchers = [
    {
      type: "startsWith",
      watchFor: "#",
      render: (tag) => <a href={`/posts?filterByTag=${tag}`}>{tag}</a>,
    },
    {
      type: "startsWith",
      watchFor: "@",
      render: (mention) => <i>{mention}</i>,
    },
    {
      type: "endsWith",
      watchFor: "*",
      render: (text) => <span style={{ color: "red" }}>{text}</span>,
    },
    {
      watchFor: "link",
      render: (url) => (
        <a href={url} target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener nofollow">
          {url}
        </a>
      ),
    },
    {
      watchFor: "email",
      render: (url: string) => (
        <a href={`mailto:${url}`} target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">
          {url.replace("@", "[at]")}
        </a>
      ),
    },
  ];

  return (
    <LinkParser watchers={watchers}>
      #Far_far_away, behind the word mountains, far from the countries @Vokalia and @Consonantia, there live the blind
      texts. Separated they live in @Bookmarksgrove right at the coast of the Semantics*, a large language ocean. A
      small river named Duden flows by their place and supplies it with the necessary regelialia. \n Credit: \n
      https://www.blindtextgenerator.com/lorem-ipsum \n Contact Me: happy.cactus@mail.me
    </LinkParser>
  );
}

Props

Name	Required	Type	Default	Description
children	Yes	Node		Only the text will be rendered
newLineWatcher		String	\\n	If parseNewLine is true, what character(s) should be considered as new line.
parseNewLine		Boolean	true	Whether new line should be parsed as <br />
watchers		Array	link watcher	An array of watchers

Watcher props

Name	Required	Type	Default	Description
render	Yes	Function	anchor	A function to customize watcher render
type		startsWith or endsWith	startsWith	Where should it watch to find the watchFor clue
watchFor	Yes	link or email or String	link	What to look up in the string