 <p>Well, you can check if a variable is an array or string using instanceOf or typeOf or .constuctor: See here <a href="http://tobyho.com/2011/01/28/checking-types-in-javascript/" rel="nofollow">http://tobyho.com/2011/01/28/checking-types-in-javascript/</a> </p> <pre><code> if(myVariable instanceOf Array){ //multi select } else if(myVariable.constructor === String){ //single select } </code></pre> <hr> <p>or you can simply convert your string to an array and check the length of the array.</p> <pre><code> $scope.myVariable = $scope.myPreviousVar.split(','); // or however you want to delimit this if($scope.myVariable.length === 1){ //single select } else if($scope.myVariable.length &gt; 1){ //multi select } </code></pre>