For keyboard and mouse events, this property determines which key or button you are pressing.
Event.which normalizes event.keyCode and event.charCode . It is recommended to use event.which to monitor keyboard input. See event.charCode on the MDC for more details .
Keydown property will monitor the button event.
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<script src="http://code.jquery.com/jquery-latest.min.js"></script>
</head>
<body>
<input id="whichkey" value="type something">
<div id="log"></div>
<script>
$('#whichkey').bind('keydown',function(e){
$('#log').html(e.type + ': ' + e.which ); });
</script>
</body>
</html>