Perceivable · Level AA · 1.3.5
Identify Input Purpose
Form fields that collect common personal information — name, email, address, phone number, birthday — need a standard `autocomplete` value identifying what that field is for, so the browser can offer to fill it in automatically instead of making the user type and remember it every time.
- Cognitive
- Motor
How to recognize it
Inspect a form's input fields for a name, address, phone number, or similar personal detail, and check whether they carry the matching `autocomplete` attribute from the HTML spec's defined list (`name`, `email`, `tel`, `street-address`, `bday`, and so on). A field that's visually and semantically a 'full name' input but has no `autocomplete="name"` — or worse, `autocomplete="off"` — blocks the browser's autofill from recognizing and offering to fill it. This matters most for people with memory, language, or executive-function-related disabilities (including from conditions like cerebral palsy, stroke, or motor neuron disease) who benefit from not having to recall and retype the same information repeatedly, and for people with motor impairments for whom typing itself is slow or effortful — autofill removes keystrokes they'd otherwise have to make one at a time.
How to fix it
Add the matching `autocomplete` value from the standard Input Purposes list to every field that collects information about the user themselves — not arbitrary business data, just personal details like name, address, and contact info. Where a single field genuinely serves two purposes at once (a combined username-or-email field) and the technology can't express both, picking one value or omitting it is acceptable — the criterion only expects a match when one clearly applies.
Example
Avoid
<label for="full-name">Full name</label>
<input id="full-name" type="text">
<!-- no autocomplete attribute at all -->Prefer
<label for="full-name">Full name</label>
<input id="full-name" type="text" autocomplete="name"><label for="email">Email</label>
<input id="email" type="email" autocomplete="email">