How to detect if a user clicks browser back button in Angularjs

Question

I have a form-like page with some data. And want to show a popup/alert when a user clicks the browser back button, asking \"if they want to go back or stay on the same page\

Answer 1

Similar to syraz37's answer, but for the new $transition API:

angular
    .module('app')
    .run(function($rootScope, $transitions) {

        // Track "previous state" to be used elsewhere to determine if the user
        // goes "back".
        $transitions.onStart({}, (transition) => {
            if ($rootScope._previousState === transition.$to().name) {
                $rootScope._isPreviousState = true;
            } else {
                $rootScope._isPreviousState = false;
            }
            $rootScope._previousState = transition.$from().name;
        });

    });

Then in any controller, you can check if it's being loaded as the "previous state":

if ($rootScope._isPreviousState) {
    // ...reload some aspect of the controller state...
}

This falls to the caveat pointed out by ninjaPixel above where you could go to state A, then state B, then state A again (all in a forward direction) and it would think the user has gone "back", but for our needs this works.