document.referrer sometimes returns blank value

Question

Page A contains a DetailsList, which has links to different pages. Page B contains a file viewer web part.

Clicking on any of the links on "Page A" DetailsList row items, directs the user to "Page B".

I am trying to fetch the Page A url using document.referrer but it returns a blank value. Rarely it gives the correct url.

Is there any way to ensure the document.referrer returns the correct url?

Answer 1

• Since version 85 of Chrome, the default referrer policy has changed from no-referrer-when-downgrade to strict-origin-when-cross-origin.

• document.referrer will only work if the person got to the current page through a link, or clicking something.... not if they were redirected through other means.

• If you rely on the referrer header for your API, best is to specify the referrerPolicy for these calls as follows:

await ctx.httpClient.post(creatorUrl, HttpClient.configurations.v1, {
  headers: {
    "Authorization": `Bearer ${token}`,
    "content-type": "application/json",
  },
  referrerPolicy: 'no-referrer-when-downgrade', // Provide `referrerPolicy` option for falling back to the previous default
  body: JSON.stringify(msg)
});

Refer the below article for more details.

• watch-referrer-header