1.4.3 placeholder contrast requirement if placeholder text is redundant

[detlevhfischer]

In a situation where a text field has a label with sufficient contrast and a placeholder text that does not add any additional information has a contrast below 4.5:1, the question arises whether this must be considered a fail. If the placeholder would be missing, there would be no issue (the label being sufficently descriptive, placeholder is not required). So it could be argued that it should not be a failure if there is a low contrast placeholder that does not add any information.

Example:

<label for="sn">Name</label>
<input id="sn" type="text" placeholder="Name" />

The issue came up in today's MATF call https://www.w3.org/2025/04/16-matf-minutes.html

Any views?

[mraccess77]

I would agree that if the placeholder only duplicates the on-screen text then there is not a fail for contrast of the placeholder text. It's also not a good use of placeholder though.

[detlevhfischer]

@mraccess77

A redundant variant without exact repetition of label text (and, in our view, no contrast requirement) would be

<label for="sn">First name</label>
<input id="sn" type="text" placeholder="Mary" />

but it gets trickier (and arguably no longer conformant) with

<label for="sn">Name</label>
<input id="sn" type="text" placeholder="Mary Smith" />

...because now, placeholder communicates that the name field should contain first name and surname.

And then you have cases like

<label for="sn">Birth date</label>
<input id="sn" type="date" placeholder="DD.MM.YYYY" />

...where the placeholder communicates the required format and clearly needs to meet contrast requirements (and this would also fail 3.3.2 due to the non-permanent additional information in placeholder).

[mraccess77]

I agree, that when it communicates something else like format and required content not included in the label then it would need to have sufficient contrast.