Text Input

When to use this component

Use the text input component when you need to let users enter text that’s no longer than a single line, such as their name or phone number.

When not to use this component

Do not use the text input component if you need to let users enter longer answers that might span multiple lines. In this case, you should use a textarea instead.

How it works

Example

Sample HTML Code

<form action="" class="govcy-form" novalidate>
    <div class="govcy-form-control">
        <label class="govcy-label" for="input">Label</label>
        <span class="govcy-hint">Hint</span>
        <input type="text" class="govcy-text-input">
    </div>
</form>

Important: All text inputs must have visible labels; placeholder text is not an acceptable replacement for a label as it vanishes when users start typing.
Labels should be aligned above the text input they refer to. They should be short, direct and written in sentence case. Do not use colons at the end of labels.

If you are asking just one question per page as recommended, you can set the contents of the <label> as the page heading.

Read more about why and how to set legends as headings.

If you’re asking more than one question on the page, do not set the contents of the <legent> as the page heading. Read more about asking multiple questions on question pages.

Use hint text for help that’s relevant to the majority of users, like how their information will be used, or where to find it.

Show errors

Error messages should follow the guidance in error message and have specific error messages for specific error states.

Example

Sample HTML Code

<form action="" class="govcy-form" novalidate>
    <div class="govcy-form-control govcy-form-control-error">
        <label class="govcy-label" for="input">Label</label>
        <span class="govcy-input-error-msg">There is an error</span>
        <input type="text" class="govcy-text-input govcy-text-input-error">
    </div>
</form>

Use appropriately-sized text inputs

Help users understand what they should enter by making text inputs the right size for the content they’re intended for.

By default, the width of text inputs is fluid and will fit the full width of the container they are placed into.

If you want to make the input smaller, you can either use a fixed width input, or use the width override classes to create a smaller, fluid width input.

Example

Sample HTML Code

<form action="" class="govcy-form" novalidate>
    <div class="govcy-form-control">
        <label class="govcy-label" for="input">Label</label>
        <input type="text" class="govcy-text-input govcy-text-input-char_20" placeholder="20 Characters" maxlength="20">
    </div>
    <div class="govcy-form-control">
        <label class="govcy-label" for="input">Label</label>
        <input type="text" class="govcy-text-input govcy-text-input-char_10" placeholder="10 Characters" maxlength="10">
    </div>
    <div class="govcy-form-control">
        <label class="govcy-label" for="input">Label</label>
        <input type="text" class="govcy-text-input govcy-text-input-char_5" placeholder="5 Chars" maxlength="5">
    </div>
    <div class="govcy-form-control">
        <label class="govcy-label" for="input">Label</label>
        <input type="text" class="govcy-text-input govcy-text-input-char_4" placeholder="4 Chars" maxlength="4">
    </div>
    <div class="govcy-form-control">
        <label class="govcy-label" for="input">Label</label>
        <input type="text" class="govcy-text-input govcy-text-input-char_3" placeholder="3" maxlength="3">
    </div>
    <div class="govcy-form-control">
        <label class="govcy-label" for="input">Label</label>
        <input type="text" class="govcy-text-input govcy-text-input-char_2" placeholder="2" maxlength="2">
    </div>
</form>

Textarea

Use the textarea component when you need to let users enter an amount of text that’s longer than a single line.

Example

Sample HTML Code

<form action="" class="govcy-form" novalidate>
    <div class="govcy-form-control">
        <label class="govcy-label" for="input">Can you provide more detail?</label>
        <span class="govcy-hint">Do not include personal or financial information, like credit card details.</span>
        <textarea class="govcy-text-area" rows="5"></textarea>
        <span class="govcy-hint">You may enter up to 300 characters.</span>
    </div>
</form>

Do not disable copy and paste

Users will often need to copy and paste information into a text input or a textarea, so do not stop them from doing this.

How and when to spellcheck a user’s input

If you are asking users for information which is not appropriate to spellcheck, like a reference number, name, email address or Social Insurance number, disable the spellcheck.

To do this set the spellcheck attribute to false as shown in this example.

Example

Sample HTML Code

<form action="" class="govcy-form" novalidate>
    <div class="govcy-form-control">
        <label class="govcy-label" for="input">Social Insurance</label>
        <input type="text" class="govcy-text-input" spellcheck="false">
    </div>
</form>

Mobile and Finger-friendly numeric inputs

For mobile and figner friendly numeric inputs, use the inputmode and pattern attributes. Do not use <input type="number"> as there is a risk of users accidentally incrementing a number when they’re trying to do something else - for example, scroll up or down the page.

Example

Sample HTML Code

<form action="" class="govcy-form" novalidate>
    <div class="govcy-form-control">
        <label class="govcy-label" for="input">Credit Card number</label>
        <input type="text" class="govcy-text-input" spellcheck="false" pattern="[0-9]*" inputmode="numeric">
    </div>
</form>

An other example of using inputmode and pattern attributes can be found on the date input component.

This suggestion is not applicable to the telephone number pattern.

Turn off HTML5 validation

Do not use HTML5 validation because the visual style, placement and content of HTML5 error messages cannot be made consistent with the GOV.CY Design System

To turn off HTML5 validation, add novalidate to your form tags.

Sample HTML Code

<form action="" class="govcy-form" novalidate>

Do not add required to your input fields.

Use the autocomplete attribute

Use the autocomplete attribute on text inputs to help users complete forms more quickly. This lets you specify an input’s purpose so browsers can autofill the information on a user’s behalf if they’ve entered it previously.

For example, to enable autofill on a postcode field, set the autocomplete attribute to postal-code.

Example

Sample HTML Code

<form action="" class="govcy-form" novalidate>
    <div class="govcy-form-control">
        <label class="govcy-label" for="input">Postcode</label>
        <input type="text" class="govcy-text-input"spellcheck="false" autocomplete="postal-code">
    </div>
</form>