How can I capture the right-click event in JavaScript?

I think that you are looking for something like this:

   function rightclick() {
    var rightclick;
    var e = window.event;
    if (e.which) rightclick = (e.which == 3);
    else if (e.button) rightclick = (e.button == 2);
    alert(rightclick); // true or false, you can trap right click here by if comparison
}

(http://www.quirksmode.org/js/events_properties.html)

And then use the onmousedown even with the function rightclick() (if you want to use it globally on whole page you can do this <body onmousedown=rightclick(); >


Use the oncontextmenu event.

Here's an example:

<div oncontextmenu="javascript:alert('success!');return false;">
    Lorem Ipsum
</div>

And using event listeners (credit to rampion from a comment in 2011):

el.addEventListener('contextmenu', function(ev) {
    ev.preventDefault();
    alert('success!');
    return false;
}, false);

Don't forget to return false, otherwise the standard context menu will still pop up.

If you are going to use a function you've written rather than javascript:alert("Success!"), remember to return false in BOTH the function AND the oncontextmenu attribute.