Why Your Handlebars Template Fails to Render HTML: A Simple Fix

Discover how to fix issues with Handlebars not rendering HTML properly in your Express project. Understand the importance of triple braces and get your application displaying HTML as intended.
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This video is based on the question https://stackoverflow.com/q/68038666/ asked by the user 'Duy Nguyen Tho' ( https://stackoverflow.com/u/11679050/ ) and on the answer https://stackoverflow.com/a/68038743/ provided by the user 'Duy Nguyen Tho' ( https://stackoverflow.com/u/11679050/ ) at 'Stack Overflow' website. Thanks to these great users and Stackexchange community for their contributions.

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Why Your Handlebars Template Fails to Render HTML: A Simple Fix

When developing web applications using Node.js and Express, you might encounter an issue with Handlebars where the HTML within your templates is displayed as plain text rather than being rendered. This can be frustrating and confusing, especially for those who are new to these technologies. In this guide, we'll explore why this issue occurs and how to resolve it, ensuring that your web application's content is displayed correctly.

The Problem: Handlebars Rendering Plain Text

In your Express application, you might have set up Handlebars as your view engine, intending to render templates that include HTML. However, instead of rendering the HTML you wrote in your templates, you see it being presented as plain text. For example, the following code in your home.handlebars file:

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is displayed literally as <h1>Home</h1>, which is not the desired outcome.

Example of faulty code

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And you may have this in your main.handlebars:

[[See Video to Reveal this Text or Code Snippet]]

The Solution: Use Triple Braces

The fundamental issue here is the usage of double braces {{body}}. In Handlebars, double braces are used to safely escape HTML, meaning that it will render the HTML as plain text (which is why you see it displayed literally). To allow rendering of the HTML instead, you need to use triple braces, like this:

[[See Video to Reveal this Text or Code Snippet]]

By switching to triple braces, you're indicating to Handlebars that it should not escape HTML entities, allowing your content to be rendered correctly.

Updated Template

Make sure to modify your main.handlebars to look like this:

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Summary of Changes

Change {{body}} to {{{body}}} in your Handlebars templates to allow HTML rendering.

Conclusion

By understanding how Handlebars handles HTML with its braces notation, you can quickly resolve issues related to HTML rendering in your Express applications. This small adjustment—using triple braces instead of double—will significantly improve how your templates function, allowing you to create dynamic and visually appealing web applications without issues.

With this knowledge, you can enhance your project and present your data exactly as you intend. Happy coding!

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