How to escape XML entities in JavaScript?

This might be a bit more efficient with the same outcome:

function escapeXml(unsafe) {
    return unsafe.replace(/[<>&'"]/g, function (c) {
        switch (c) {
            case '<': return '&lt;';
            case '>': return '&gt;';
            case '&': return '&amp;';
            case '\'': return '&apos;';
            case '"': return '&quot;';
        }
    });
}

If you have jQuery, here's a simple solution:

  String.prototype.htmlEscape = function() {
    return $('<div/>').text(this.toString()).html();
  };

Use it like this:

"<foo&bar>".htmlEscape(); -> "<foo&bar&gt"

you can use the below method. I have added this in prototype for easier access. I have also used negative look-ahead so it wont mess things, if you call the method twice or more.

Usage:

 var original = "Hi&there";
 var escaped = original.EncodeXMLEscapeChars();  //Hi&there

Decoding is automaticaly handeled in XML parser.

Method :

//String Extenstion to format string for xml content.
//Replces xml escape chracters to their equivalent html notation.
String.prototype.EncodeXMLEscapeChars = function () {
    var OutPut = this;
    if ($.trim(OutPut) != "") {
        OutPut = OutPut.replace(/</g, "&lt;").replace(/>/g, "&gt;").replace(/"/g, "&quot;").replace(/'/g, "&#39;");
        OutPut = OutPut.replace(/&(?!(amp;)|(lt;)|(gt;)|(quot;)|(#39;)|(apos;))/g, "&amp;");
        OutPut = OutPut.replace(/([^\\])((\\\\)*)\\(?![\\/{])/g, "$1\\\\$2");  //replaces odd backslash(\\) with even.
    }
    else {
        OutPut = "";
    }
    return OutPut;
};

It just feels time for an update now that we have string interpolation, and a few other modernisations. And uses object lookup because it really should.

const escapeXml = (unsafe) =>
    unsafe.replace(/[<>&'"]/g, (c) => `&${({
        '<': 'lt',
        '>': 'gt',
        '&': 'amp',
        '\'': 'apos',
        '"': 'quot'
    })[c]};`);

I originally used the accepted answer in production code and found that it was actually really slow when used heavily. Here is a much faster solution (runs at over twice the speed):

   var escapeXml = (function() {
        var doc = document.implementation.createDocument("", "", null)
        var el = doc.createElement("temp");
        el.textContent = "temp";
        el = el.firstChild;
        var ser =  new XMLSerializer();
        return function(text) {
            el.nodeValue = text;
            return ser.serializeToString(el);
        };
    })();

console.log(escapeXml("<>&")); //&lt;&gt;&amp;

maybe you can try this,

function encodeXML(s) {
  const dom = document.createElement('div')
  dom.textContent = s
  return dom.innerHTML
}

reference

Caution, all the regexing isn't good if you have XML inside XML.
Instead loop over the string once, and substitute all escape characters.
That way, you can't run over the same character twice.

function _xmlAttributeEscape(inputString)
{
    var output = [];

    for (var i = 0; i < inputString.length; ++i)
    {
        switch (inputString[i])
        {
            case '&':
                output.push("&amp;");
                break;
            case '"':
                output.push("&quot;");
                break;
            case "<":
                output.push("&lt;");
                break;
            case ">":
                output.push("&gt;");
                break;
            default:
                output.push(inputString[i]);
        }


    }

    return output.join("");
}

Adding on to ZZZZBov's answer, I find this a bit cleaner and easier to read:

const encodeXML = (str) =>
    str
        .replace(/&/g, '&')
        .replace(/</g, '&lt;')
        .replace(/>/g, '&gt;')
        .replace(/"/g, '&quot;')
        .replace(/'/g, '&apos;');

Additionally, all five characters can be found here for example: https://www.sitemaps.org/protocol.html

Note that this only encodes values (as other have stated).

if something is escaped from before, you could try this since this will not double escape like many others

function escape(text) {
    return String(text).replace(/(['"<>&'])(\w+;)?/g, (match, char, escaped) => {
        if(escaped) {
            return match;
        }
        
        switch(char) {
            case '\'': return '&apos;';
            case '"': return '&quot;';
            case '<': return '&lt;';
            case '>': return '&gt;';
            case '&': return '&amp;';
        }
    });
}

Technically, &, < and > aren't valid XML entity name characters. If you can't trust the key variable, you should filter them out.

If you want them escaped as HTML entities, you could use something like http://www.strictly-software.com/htmlencode .

Faced to a similar problem, but on the client side for HTML, I found it easier to use the DOM instead of manipulating raw HTML.

let node=document.createTextNode(myTextToEscape);

The createTextNode function also exists for XML DOM API (e.g. xmldom package for node.js).

To get the “XML source code” of the node, you can add it to an element and call innerHTML on the element or alternatively you can use an XMLSerializer object.

let myXmlCode=new XMLSerializer().serializeToString(node);

This is simple:

sText = ("" + sText).split("<").join("&lt;").split(">").join("&gt;").split('"').join("&#34;").split("'").join("&#39;");