How to remove the focus from a TextBox in WinForms?

Question

I need to remove the focus from several TextBoxes. I tried using:

textBox1.Focused = false;

Its ReadOnly property value is true.

I then tried setting the focus on the form, so as to remove it from all the TextBoxes, but this also fails to work:

this.Focus();

and the function returns false when a textbox is selected.

So, how do I remove the focus from a TextBox?

Answer 1

You can add the following code:

this.ActiveControl = null;  //this = form

Answer 2

Focusing on the label didn't work for me, doing something like label1.Focus() right? the textbox still has focus when loading the form, however trying Velociraptors answer, worked for me, setting the Form's Active control to the label like this:

private void Form1_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)  
{ 
    this.ActiveControl = label1;       
}

Answer 3

Try disabling and enabling the textbox.

Answer 4

You can also set the forms activecontrol property to null like

ActiveControl = null;

Answer 5

Focus sets the input focus, so setting it to the form won't work because forms don't accept input. Try setting the form's ActiveControl property to a different control. You could also use Select to select a specific control or SelectNextControl to select the next control in the tab order.

Answer 6

Try this one:

First set up tab order.

Then in form load event we can send a tab key press programmatically to application. So that application will give focus to 1st contol in the tab order.

in form load even write this line.

SendKeys.Send("{TAB}");

This did work for me.

Answer 7

A simple solution would be to kill the focus, just create your own class:

public class ViewOnlyTextBox : System.Windows.Forms.TextBox {
    // constants for the message sending
    const int WM_SETFOCUS = 0x0007;
    const int WM_KILLFOCUS = 0x0008;

    protected override void WndProc(ref Message m) {
        if(m.Msg == WM_SETFOCUS) m.Msg = WM_KILLFOCUS;

        base.WndProc (ref m);
    }
}

Answer 8

This post lead me to do this:

ActiveControl = null;

This allows me to capture all the keyboard input at the top level without other controls going nuts.

Answer 9

I made this on my custom control, i done this onFocus()

this.Parent.Focus();

So if texbox focused - it instantly focus textbox parent (form, or panel...) This is good option if you want to make this on custom control.

Answer 10

I've found a good alternative! It works best for me, without setting the focus on something else.

Try that:

private void richTextBox_KeyDown(object sender, KeyEventArgs e)
{    
    e.SuppressKeyPress = true;
}

Answer 11

It seems that I don't have to set the focus to any other elements. On a Windows Phone 7 application, I've been using the Focus method to unset the Focus of a Textbox.

Giving the following command will set the focus to nothing:

void SearchBox_KeyDown(object sender, System.Windows.Input.KeyEventArgs e)
{
    if (e.Key == Key.Enter)
    {
        Focus();
    }
}

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.windows.forms.control.focus.aspx

It worked for me, but I don't know why didn't it work for you :/

Answer 12

    //using System;
    //using System.Collections.Generic;
    //using System.Linq;

    private void Form1_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        FocusOnOtherControl(Controls.Cast<Control>(), button1);
    }

    private void FocusOnOtherControl<T>(IEnumerable<T> controls, Control focusOnMe) where T : Control
    {
        foreach (var control in controls)
        {
            if (control.GetType().Equals(typeof(TextBox)))
            {
                control.TabStop = false;
                control.LostFocus += new EventHandler((object sender, EventArgs e) =>
                {                     
                    focusOnMe.Focus();
                });
            }
        }
    }

Answer 13

The way I get around it is to place all my winform controls. I make all labels and non-selecting winform controls as tab order 0, then my first control as tab order 2 and then increment each selectable control's order by 1, so 3, 4, 5 etc...

This way, when my Winforms start up, the first TextBox doesn't have focus!

Answer 14

you can do this by two method

• just make the "TabStop" properties of desired textbox to false now it will not focus even if you have one text field

• drag two text box

  1. make one visible on which you don't want foucus which is textbox1
  2. make the 2nd one invisible and go to properties of that text field and select

tabindex value to 0 of textbox2

3. and select the tabindex of your textbox1 to 1 now it will not focus on textbox1

Answer 15

If all you want is the optical effect that the textbox has no blue selection all over its contents, just select no text:

textBox_Log.SelectionStart = 0;
textBox_Log.SelectionLength = 0;
textBox_Log.Select();

After this, when adding content with .Text += "...", no blue selection will be shown.

Answer 16

Please try set TabStop to False for your view control which is not be focused.

For eg:

txtEmpID.TabStop = false;

Answer 17

You can try:

textBox1.Enable = false;

Answer 18

using System.Windows.Input

Keyboard.ClearFocus();

Answer 19

Kinda late to the party in 2022, however none of the solutions here worked for me (idk why) using .Net_6.0_windows, so I've come up with this solution:

Label focusoutLabel = new Label() { 
    Text = "",
    Name = "somegenericplaceholdernamethatwillneverbeusedinmyprogram",
    Visible = false,
};
this.Controls.Add(focusoutLabel);
this.ActiveControl = focusoutLabel;

^Place this code to your Form load handler^

Answer 20

In the constructor of the Form or UserControl holding the TextBox write

SetStyle(ControlStyles.Selectable, false);

After the InitializeComponent(); Source: https://stackoverflow.com/a/4811938/5750078

Example:

public partial class Main : UserControl
{

    public Main()
    {
        InitializeComponent();
        SetStyle(ControlStyles.Selectable, false);
    }