Events

SuperDoc uses an event system for lifecycle hooks and change notifications.

Driving live React UI state? Prefer superdoc/ui subscriptions. useSuperDocSelection, useSuperDocComments, useSuperDocTrackChanges, useSuperDocDocument, and useSuperDocCommand give you typed, memoized, per-slice state with one re-render per change instead of a manual superdoc.on('editor-update', ...) loop. See Custom UI.

The events on this page are for lifecycle (ready, editor-create), integration (error, comment-changed), analytics, and compatibility with code that doesn’t use the React surface.

Subscribing to events

Usage

superdoc.on('ready', handler);     // Subscribe
superdoc.once('ready', handler);   // One-time listener
superdoc.off('ready', handler);    // Unsubscribe

Lifecycle events

ready

Fired when SuperDoc is fully initialized.

Usage

superdoc.on('ready', ({ superdoc }) => {
  // Safe to use all features
});

editorBeforeCreate

Fired before an editor is created. Use this to configure extensions or set up services.

Usage

superdoc.on('editorBeforeCreate', ({ editor }) => {
  // Configure before editor mounts
});

editorCreate

When an editor is created.

Usage

superdoc.on('editorCreate', ({ editor }) => {
  editor.focus();
});

editorDestroy

When an editor is destroyed.

Usage

superdoc.on('editorDestroy', () => {
  cleanup();
});

Content events

editor-update

When editor content changes. Use this to refresh live UI state like word counts or auto-save.

Usage

superdoc.on('editor-update', ({ editor }) => {
  if (!editor) return;
  autoSave(editor.getJSON());
});

Live counter example: Read editor.doc.info() inside the handler to build a live document-stats panel without polling.

superdoc.on('editor-update', ({ editor }) => {
  const { counts } = editor.doc.info();
  document.getElementById('stats').textContent =
    `${counts.words} words, ${counts.characters} characters, ` +
    `${counts.trackedChanges} tracked changes, ${counts.lists} lists`;
});

content-error

When content processing fails.

Usage

superdoc.on('content-error', ({ error, editor }) => {
  console.error('Content error:', error);
});

fonts-resolved

When document fonts are resolved.

Usage

superdoc.on('fonts-resolved', ({ documentFonts, unsupportedFonts }) => {
  if (unsupportedFonts.length > 0) {
    console.warn('Unsupported fonts:', unsupportedFonts.join(', '));
  }
});

Content controls (SDT fields)

content-control:active-change

Fires when selection enters a content control, switches between controls, or leaves all controls.

superdoc.on('content-control:active-change', ({ active, previous, activePath, source }) => {
  // source: 'keyboard' | 'pointer'
  // active / previous: SdtRef | null
  // activePath: SdtRef[] - full active stack, innermost first ([] when none)
});

SdtRef shape:

type SdtRef = {
  id: string;
  tag?: string;
  alias?: string;
  controlType: string;
  scope: 'inline' | 'block';
};

active is the deepest control (activePath[0]); activePath holds the full stack, innermost first. Controls without an id do not emit these events.

How to interpret:

1. Focus (null -> A): previous === null && active !== null
2. Switch (A -> B): previous !== null && active !== null && previous.id !== active.id
3. Blur (A -> null): previous !== null && active === null

content-control:click

Fires on pointer click inside a content control.

superdoc.on('content-control:click', ({ target, source }) => {
  // source is always 'pointer'
  // target: SdtRef
});

Both are also available as config callbacks: onContentControlActiveChange and onContentControlClick.

To build your own content-control UI on these events, see Custom UI > Content controls.

Comments events

comments-update

When comments are modified.

Usage

superdoc.on('comments-update', ({ type, comment, changes }) => {
  // type: 'add', 'update', 'deleted', 'resolved'
  // comment: the comment object (when applicable)
  // changes: per-field change set (when the update is a mutation)
});

Collaboration events

collaboration-ready

When collaboration is initialized.

Usage

superdoc.on('collaboration-ready', ({ editor }) => {
  showOnlineUsers();
});

awareness-update

When user presence changes.

Usage

superdoc.on('awareness-update', ({ states, added, removed }) => {
  updateUserCursors(states);
});

locked

When document lock state changes.

Usage

superdoc.on('locked', ({ isLocked, lockedBy }) => {
  if (isLocked && lockedBy) {
    showLockBanner(`Locked by ${lockedBy.name}`);
  }
});

Pagination events

pagination-update

Fired after each layout pass with the current page count. Use this to know when page data is available: activeEditor.currentTotalPages is only populated after the first layout completes, which happens after the ready event.

Usage

superdoc.on('pagination-update', ({ totalPages, superdoc }) => {
  console.log(`Document has ${totalPages} pages`);
});

UI events

zoomChange

When the zoom level changes, from any source: setZoom(), the toolbar zoom control, or fit-width mode. The payload carries the value and the mode that produced it. Also available as the onZoomChange config callback.

Usage

superdoc.on('zoomChange', ({ zoom, mode }) => {
  console.log(`Zoom: ${zoom}% (${mode})`);
});

viewport-change

When the fit-width calculation changes. Pixel-level width changes that do not affect the rounded fit are deduped. getViewportMetrics() always reads the latest measurements.

• availableWidth - container width in pixels, minus the comments sidebar when visible
• documentWidth - the widest document page width in pixels at 100% zoom (zoom-independent; DOCX from laid-out pages with page-styles fallback, PDF from rendered pages)
• fitZoom - the unclamped zoom percentage that fits the page into the available width

HTML documents reflow to the container, so an HTML-only instance reports no metrics.

For most use cases, prefer zoom.mode: 'fit-width'. Subscribe to this event only when you want to apply custom zoom behavior.

Usage

superdoc.on('viewport-change', ({ fitZoom }) => {
  superdoc.setZoom(Math.min(100, Math.max(35, fitZoom)));
});

sidebar-toggle

When the comments sidebar is toggled.

Usage

superdoc.on('sidebar-toggle', (isOpened) => {
  adjustLayout(isOpened);
});

Error events

exception

When an error occurs during document processing or runtime.

Usage

superdoc.on('exception', (payload) => {
  // `payload` is a discriminated union; narrow before reading variant-specific fields.
  // `code` is only on the editor-lifecycle variant; `stage` is only on document-init.
  console.error('SuperDoc error:', payload.error);
});

Configuration-based events

Events can also be set during initialization:

new SuperDoc({
  selector: '#editor',
  document: 'document.docx',
  onReady: ({ superdoc }) => { },
  onEditorBeforeCreate: ({ editor }) => { },
  onEditorCreate: ({ editor }) => { },
  onEditorUpdate: ({ editor }) => { },
  onFontsResolved: ({ documentFonts, unsupportedFonts }) => { },
  onPaginationUpdate: ({ totalPages, superdoc }) => { },
  onSidebarToggle: (isOpened) => { },
  onException: ({ error }) => { },
});

Event order

1. editorBeforeCreate: Before editor mounts
2. editorCreate: Editor ready
3. ready: All editors ready
4. collaboration-ready: If collaboration enabled
5. pagination-update: After each layout pass (page count available)
6. Runtime events (editor-update, comments-update, sidebar-toggle, etc.)
7. editorDestroy: Cleanup