Link

<Link> is a React component that extends the HTML <a> element to provide prefetching and client-side navigation between routes. It is the primary way to navigate between routes in Next.js.

Basic usage:

import Link from 'next/link'
 
export default function Page() {
  return <Link href="/dashboard">Dashboard</Link>
}

Reference

The following props can be passed to the <Link> component:

Good to know: <a> tag attributes such as className or target="_blank" can be added to <Link> as props and will be passed to the underlying <a> element.

href (required)

The path or URL to navigate to.

import Link from 'next/link'
 
// Navigate to /about?name=test
export default function Page() {
  return (
    <Link
      href={{
        pathname: '/about',
        query: { name: 'test' },
      }}
    >
      About
    </Link>
  )
}

replace

Defaults to false. When true, next/link will replace the current history state instead of adding a new URL into the browser's history stack.

import Link from 'next/link'
 
export default function Page() {
  return (
    <Link href="/dashboard" replace>
      Dashboard
    </Link>
  )
}

scroll

Defaults to true. The default scrolling behavior of <Link> in Next.js is to maintain scroll position, similar to how browsers handle back and forwards navigation. When you navigate to a new Page, scroll position will stay the same as long as the Page is visible in the viewport. However, if the Page is not visible in the viewport, Next.js will scroll to the top of the first Page element.

When scroll = {false}, Next.js will not attempt to scroll to the first Page element.

Good to know: Next.js checks if scroll: false before managing scroll behavior. If scrolling is enabled, it identifies the relevant DOM node for navigation and inspects each top-level element. All non-scrollable elements and those without rendered HTML are bypassed, this includes sticky or fixed positioned elements, and non-visible elements such as those calculated with getBoundingClientRect. Next.js then continues through siblings until it identifies a scrollable element that is visible in the viewport.

import Link from 'next/link'
 
export default function Page() {
  return (
    <Link href="/dashboard" scroll={false}>
      Dashboard
    </Link>
  )
}

prefetch

Prefetching happens when a <Link /> component enters the user's viewport (initially or through scroll). Next.js prefetches and loads the linked route (denoted by the href) and its data in the background to improve the performance of client-side navigations. If the prefetched data has expired by the time the user hovers over a <Link />, Next.js will attempt to prefetch it again. Prefetching is only enabled in production.

The following values can be passed to the prefetch prop:

• null (default): Prefetch behavior depends on whether the route is static or dynamic. For static routes, the full route will be prefetched (including all its data). For dynamic routes, the partial route down to the nearest segment with a loading.js boundary will be prefetched.
• true: The full route will be prefetched for both static and dynamic routes.
• false: Prefetching will never happen both on entering the viewport and on hover.

import Link from 'next/link'
 
export default function Page() {
  return (
    <Link href="/dashboard" prefetch={false}>
      Dashboard
    </Link>
  )
}

onNavigate

An event handler called during client-side navigation. The handler receives an event object that includes a preventDefault() method, allowing you to cancel the navigation if needed.

import Link from 'next/link'
 
export default function Page() {
  return (
    <Link
      href="/dashboard"
      onNavigate={(e) => {
        // Only executes during SPA navigation
        console.log('Navigating...')
 
        // Optionally prevent navigation
        // e.preventDefault()
      }}
    >
      Dashboard
    </Link>
  )
}

Good to know: While onClick and onNavigate may seem similar, they serve different purposes. onClick executes for all click events, while onNavigate only runs during client-side navigation. Some key differences:

• When using modifier keys (Ctrl/Cmd + Click), onClick executes but onNavigate doesn't since Next.js prevents default navigation for new tabs.
• External URLs won't trigger onNavigate since it's only for client-side and same-origin navigations.
• Links with the download attribute will work with onClick but not onNavigate since the browser will treat the linked URL as a download.

Examples

The following examples demonstrate how to use the <Link> component in different scenarios.

Linking to dynamic segments

When linking to dynamic segments, you can use template literals and interpolation to generate a list of links. For example, to generate a list of blog posts:

import Link from 'next/link'
 
interface Post {
  id: number
  title: string
  slug: string
}
 
export default function PostList({ posts }: { posts: Post[] }) {
  return (
    <ul>
      {posts.map((post) => (
        <li key={post.id}>
          <Link href={`/blog/${post.slug}`}>{post.title}</Link>
        </li>
      ))}
    </ul>
  )
}

Checking active links

You can use usePathname() to determine if a link is active. For example, to add a class to the active link, you can check if the current pathname matches the href of the link:

'use client'
 
import { usePathname } from 'next/navigation'
import Link from 'next/link'
 
export function Links() {
  const pathname = usePathname()
 
  return (
    <nav>
      <Link className={`link ${pathname === '/' ? 'active' : ''}`} href="/">
        Home
      </Link>
 
      <Link
        className={`link ${pathname === '/about' ? 'active' : ''}`}
        href="/about"
      >
        About
      </Link>
    </nav>
  )
}

Scrolling to an id

If you'd like to scroll to a specific id on navigation, you can append your URL with a # hash link or just pass a hash link to the href prop. This is possible since <Link> renders to an <a> element.

<Link href="/dashboard#settings">Settings</Link>
 
// Output
<a href="/dashboard#settings">Settings</a>

Good to know:

• Next.js will scroll to the Page if it is not visible in the viewport upon navigation.

Linking to dynamic route segments

For dynamic route segments, it can be handy to use template literals to create the link's path.

For example, you can generate a list of links to the dynamic route app/blog/[slug]/page.js:

import Link from 'next/link'
 
export default function Page({ posts }) {
  return (
    <ul>
      {posts.map((post) => (
        <li key={post.id}>
          <Link href={`/blog/${post.slug}`}>{post.title}</Link>
        </li>
      ))}
    </ul>
  )
}

If the child is a custom component that wraps an <a> tag

If the child of Link is a custom component that wraps an <a> tag, you must add passHref to Link. This is necessary if you’re using libraries like styled-components. Without this, the <a> tag will not have the href attribute, which hurts your site's accessibility and might affect SEO. If you're using ESLint, there is a built-in rule next/link-passhref to ensure correct usage of passHref.

import Link from 'next/link'
import styled from 'styled-components'
 
// This creates a custom component that wraps an <a> tag
const RedLink = styled.a`
  color: red;
`
 
function NavLink({ href, name }) {
  return (
    <Link href={href} passHref legacyBehavior>
      <RedLink>{name}</RedLink>
    </Link>
  )
}
 
export default NavLink

• If you’re using emotion’s JSX pragma feature (@jsx jsx), you must use passHref even if you use an <a> tag directly.
• The component should support onClick property to trigger navigation correctly.

Nesting a functional component

If the child of Link is a functional component, in addition to using passHref and legacyBehavior, you must wrap the component in React.forwardRef:

import Link from 'next/link'
import React from 'react'
 
// Define the props type for MyButton
interface MyButtonProps {
  onClick?: React.MouseEventHandler<HTMLAnchorElement>
  href?: string
}
 
// Use React.ForwardRefRenderFunction to properly type the forwarded ref
const MyButton: React.ForwardRefRenderFunction<
  HTMLAnchorElement,
  MyButtonProps
> = ({ onClick, href }, ref) => {
  return (
    <a href={href} onClick={onClick} ref={ref}>
      Click Me
    </a>
  )
}
 
// Use React.forwardRef to wrap the component
const ForwardedMyButton = React.forwardRef(MyButton)
 
export default function Page() {
  return (
    <Link href="/about" passHref legacyBehavior>
      <ForwardedMyButton />
    </Link>
  )
}

Replace the URL instead of push

The default behavior of the Link component is to push a new URL into the history stack. You can use the replace prop to prevent adding a new entry, as in the following example:

import Link from 'next/link'
 
export default function Page() {
  return (
    <Link href="/about" replace>
      About us
    </Link>
  )
}

Disable scrolling to the top of the page

The default scrolling behavior of <Link> in Next.js is to maintain scroll position, similar to how browsers handle back and forwards navigation. When you navigate to a new Page, scroll position will stay the same as long as the Page is visible in the viewport.

However, if the Page is not visible in the viewport, Next.js will scroll to the top of the first Page element. If you'd like to disable this behavior, you can pass scroll={false} to the <Link> component, or scroll: false to router.push() or router.replace().

import Link from 'next/link'
 
export default function Page() {
  return (
    <Link href="/#hashid" scroll={false}>
      Disables scrolling to the top
    </Link>
  )
}

Using router.push() or router.replace():

// useRouter
import { useRouter } from 'next/navigation'
 
const router = useRouter()
 
router.push('/dashboard', { scroll: false })

Prefetching links in Middleware

It's common to use Middleware for authentication or other purposes that involve rewriting the user to a different page. In order for the <Link /> component to properly prefetch links with rewrites via Middleware, you need to tell Next.js both the URL to display and the URL to prefetch. This is required to avoid un-necessary fetches to middleware to know the correct route to prefetch.

For example, if you want to serve a /dashboard route that has authenticated and visitor views, you can add the following in your Middleware to redirect the user to the correct page:

import { NextResponse } from 'next/server'
 
export function middleware(request: Request) {
  const nextUrl = request.nextUrl
  if (nextUrl.pathname === '/dashboard') {
    if (request.cookies.authToken) {
      return NextResponse.rewrite(new URL('/auth/dashboard', request.url))
    } else {
      return NextResponse.rewrite(new URL('/public/dashboard', request.url))
    }
  }
}

In this case, you would want to use the following code in your <Link /> component:

'use client'
 
import Link from 'next/link'
import useIsAuthed from './hooks/useIsAuthed' // Your auth hook
 
export default function Page() {
  const isAuthed = useIsAuthed()
  const path = isAuthed ? '/auth/dashboard' : '/public/dashboard'
  return (
    <Link as="/dashboard" href={path}>
      Dashboard
    </Link>
  )
}

Blocking navigation

You can use the onNavigate prop to block navigation when certain conditions are met, such as when a form has unsaved changes. When you need to block navigation across multiple components in your app (like preventing navigation from any link while a form is being edited), React Context provides a clean way to share this blocking state. First, create a context to track the navigation blocking state:

'use client'
 
import { createContext, useState, useContext } from 'react'
 
interface NavigationBlockerContextType {
  isBlocked: boolean
  setIsBlocked: (isBlocked: boolean) => void
}
 
export const NavigationBlockerContext =
  createContext<NavigationBlockerContextType>({
    isBlocked: false,
    setIsBlocked: () => {},
  })
 
export function NavigationBlockerProvider({
  children,
}: {
  children: React.ReactNode
}) {
  const [isBlocked, setIsBlocked] = useState(false)
 
  return (
    <NavigationBlockerContext.Provider value={{ isBlocked, setIsBlocked }}>
      {children}
    </NavigationBlockerContext.Provider>
  )
}
 
export function useNavigationBlocker() {
  return useContext(NavigationBlockerContext)
}

Create a form component that uses the context:

'use client'
 
import { useNavigationBlocker } from '../contexts/navigation-blocker'
 
export default function Form() {
  const { setIsBlocked } = useNavigationBlocker()
 
  return (
    <form
      onSubmit={(e) => {
        e.preventDefault()
        setIsBlocked(false)
      }}
      onChange={() => setIsBlocked(true)}
    >
      <input type="text" name="name" />
      <button type="submit">Save</button>
    </form>
  )
}

Create a custom Link component that blocks navigation:

'use client'
 
import Link from 'next/link'
import { useNavigationBlocker } from '../contexts/navigation-blocker'
 
interface CustomLinkProps extends React.ComponentProps<typeof Link> {
  children: React.ReactNode
}
 
export function CustomLink({ children, ...props }: CustomLinkProps) {
  const { isBlocked } = useNavigationBlocker()
 
  return (
    <Link
      onNavigate={(e) => {
        if (
          isBlocked &&
          !window.confirm('You have unsaved changes. Leave anyway?')
        ) {
          e.preventDefault()
        }
      }}
      {...props}
    >
      {children}
    </Link>
  )
}

Create a navigation component:

'use client'
 
import { CustomLink as Link } from './custom-link'
 
export default function Nav() {
  return (
    <nav>
      <Link href="/">Home</Link>
      <Link href="/about">About</Link>
    </nav>
  )
}

Finally, wrap your app with the NavigationBlockerProvider in the root layout and use the components in your page:

import { NavigationBlockerProvider } from './contexts/navigation-blocker'
 
export default function RootLayout({
  children,
}: {
  children: React.ReactNode
}) {
  return (
    <html lang="en">
      <body>
        <NavigationBlockerProvider>{children}</NavigationBlockerProvider>
      </body>
    </html>
  )
}

Then, use the Nav and Form components in your page:

import Nav from './components/nav'
import Form from './components/form'
 
export default function Page() {
  return (
    <div>
      <Nav />
      <main>
        <h1>Welcome to the Dashboard</h1>
        <Form />
      </main>
    </div>
  )
}

When a user tries to navigate away using CustomLink while the form has unsaved changes, they'll be prompted to confirm before leaving.

Version history