DestroyWindow function (winuser.h)

Destroys the specified window. The function sends WM_DESTROY and WM_NCDESTROY messages to the window to deactivate it and remove the keyboard focus from it. The function also destroys the window's menu, flushes the thread message queue, destroys timers, removes clipboard ownership, and breaks the clipboard viewer chain (if the window is at the top of the viewer chain).

If the specified window is a parent or owner window, DestroyWindow automatically destroys the associated child or owned windows when it destroys the parent or owner window. The function first destroys child or owned windows, and then it destroys the parent or owner window.

DestroyWindow also destroys modeless dialog boxes created by the CreateDialog function.

Syntax

BOOL DestroyWindow(
  [in] HWND hWnd
);

Parameters

[in] hWnd

Type: HWND

A handle to the window to be destroyed.

Return value

Type: BOOL

If the function succeeds, the return value is nonzero.

If the function fails, the return value is zero. To get extended error information, call GetLastError.

Remarks

A thread cannot use DestroyWindow to destroy a window created by a different thread.

If the window being destroyed is a child window that does not have the WS_EX_NOPARENTNOTIFY style, a WM_PARENTNOTIFY message is sent to the parent.

Examples

For an example, see Destroying a Window.

Requirements

See also

Conceptual

CreateDialog

CreateWindow

CreateWindowEx

Reference

WM_DESTROY

WM_NCDESTROY

WM_PARENTNOTIFY

Windows