CKEditor 5 inspector

The official CKEditor 5 rich text editor instance inspector for developers.

Documentation 📖

Learn how to use the inspector and see it live in the Development tools guide.

Quick start

Include the script to load the inspector:

<script src="path/to/inspector.js"></script>

Call CKEditorInspector.attach( editor ) when the editor instance is ready:

ClassicEditor
	.create( ... )
	.then( editor => {
		CKEditorInspector.attach( editor );
	} )
	.catch( error => {
		console.error( error );
	} );

Note: You can attach to multiple editors under unique names at a time. Then you can select the editor instance in the drop–down inside the inspector panel to switch context.

CKEditorInspector.attach( {
	'header-editor': editor1,
	'footer-editor': editor2,
	// ...
} );

Call CKEditorInspector.detach( name ) to detach the inspector from an editor instance.

Tip: CKEditorInspector.attach() returns the generated name of the editor if it was not provided.

// Attach the inspector to two editor instances:
const generatedName = CKEditorInspector.attach( editor1 );
CKEditorInspector.attach( { arbitraryName: editor2 } );

// ...

// Detach from the instances:
CKEditorInspector.detach( generatedName );
CKEditorInspector.detach( 'arbitraryName' );

Attaching to all editor instances

When multiple CKEditor 5 instances are running in DOM, you can call CKEditorInspector.attachToAll( [ options ] ) to attach the inspector to all of them at the same time. A shorthand for CKEditorInspector.attach( editor, [ options ] ) called individually for each instance.

// Discover all editor instances in DOM and inspect them all.
CKEditorInspector.attachToAll();

You can also pass the optional configuration object to this method.

Note: This method works with CKEditor v12.3.0 or later. Earlier editor versions will not be discovered.

Toggling the inspector visibility

Click the button in the upper-right corner of the inspector to quickly show or hide it. You can also use the Alt+F12 (⌥+F12 on Mac) keyboard shortcut.

Configuration

You can pass configuration options to CKEditorInspector.attach() and CKEditorInspector.attachToAll() methods as the last argument:

CKEditorInspector.attach( editor, {
	// configuration options
} );

CKEditorInspector.attach( { 'editor-name': editor }, {
	// configuration options
} );

CKEditorInspector.attachToAll( {
	// configuration options
} );

isCollapsed

To attach the inspector with a collapsed UI, use the options.isCollapsed option.

Note: This option works when CKEditorInspector.attach() is called for the first time only.

CKEditorInspector.attach( { 'editor-name': editor }, {
	// Attach the inspector to the "editor" but the UI will be collapsed.
	isCollapsed: true
} );

Development

Note

This project requires pnpm v10 or higher. You can check your version with pnpm --version and update if needed with npm install -g pnpm@latest.

To configure the environment:

git clone [email protected]:ckeditor/ckeditor5-inspector.git
cd ckeditor5-inspector
pnpm install

Working with the code

Start the webpack file watcher:

pnpm run dev

and open http://path/to/ckeditor5-inspector/sample/inspector.html in your web browser.

Building

To build the production version of the inspector, run:

pnpm run build

Testing

To run tests, execute:

pnpm run test

Releasing the package

CircleCI automates the release process and can release both channels: stable (X.Y.Z) and pre-releases (X.Y.Z-alpha.X, etc.).

Before you start, you need to prepare the changelog entries.

1. Make sure the #master branch is up-to-date: git fetch && git checkout master && git pull.
2. Prepare a release branch: git checkout -b release-[YYYYMMDD] where YYYYMMDD is the current day.
3. Generate the changelog entries: pnpm run release:prepare-changelog.
   • You can specify the release date by passing the --date option, e.g., --date=2025-06-11.
   • By passing the --dry-run option, you can check what the script will do without actually modifying the files.
   • Read all the entries, correct poor wording and other issues, wrap code names in backticks to format them, etc.
   • Add the missing the/a articles, () to method names, "it's" -> "its", etc.
   • A newly introduced feature should have just one changelog entry – something like "The initial implementation of the FOO feature." with a description of what it does.
4. Commit all changes and prepare a new pull request targeting the #master branch.
5. Ping the @ckeditor/ckeditor-5-platform team to review the pull request and trigger the release process.

License

Licensed under a dual-license model, this software is available under:

• the GNU General Public License Version 2 or later,
• or commercial license terms from CKSource Holding sp. z o.o.

For more information, see: https://ckeditor.com/legal/ckeditor-licensing-options.