The maxlength Attribute

	Firefox 3.6	Firefox 4+	Safari 5+	Safari 4+	Chrome 6+	Opera 11+	IE 9	IE 10+	Android 2.3
Input
Textarea

The Low Down

The maxlength attribute limits the number of characters that an <input> or<textarea> can accept. The maxlength attribute on textarea is new in HTML5.

• Works for GUI-less inputs like text, email, url, search, tel and password.
• Upon data entry, browsers will not permit the user to enter more than the characters defined by the value of the maxlength attribute: cutting off the text as-you-type and truncating pasted text. This can lead to bad user experience.
• maxlength does not limit placeholder length.
• If a preset value is included with a value that has more characters than the allowed length, a validation error will not be thrown. However, if that preset value is edited, yet is still longer than the allowed length, the element will become invalid, matching the :invalid pseudoclass selector, and will be prevented from being submitted in both Opera and IE10+, which both display the tooLong validity error message.
• IE 9 reported support on both inputs and textareas but only works on inputs.