Always Show Arrows for Number Input

By  on  

While I enjoy small details that make user interfaces more elegant, I also believe that less is more, especially when it comes to native behavior. One native behavior I dislike is that <input type="number" /> elements only show the increment and decrement arrows when the input is focused. It's a needless focus change -- just show those controls all the time.

So how do we show those controls when the input isn't focused? An easy bit of CSS:

/* ensures the increment/decrement arrows always display */
input[type=number]::-webkit-inner-spin-button, 
input[type=number]::-webkit-outer-spin-button {
  opacity: 1;
}

I appreciate that the browser's native stylesheet doesn't use hidden tricks or privileged code -- it's all just CSS that we can override.

I'm always suspect when it comes to hover effects, as I feel hiding UI elements decreases accessibility no matter what the reason is.

Recent Features

  • By
    5 Awesome New Mozilla Technologies You&#8217;ve Never Heard Of

    My trip to Mozilla Summit 2013 was incredible.  I've spent so much time focusing on my project that I had lost sight of all of the great work Mozillians were putting out.  MozSummit provided the perfect reminder of how brilliant my colleagues are and how much...

  • By
    Vibration API

    Many of the new APIs provided to us by browser vendors are more targeted toward the mobile user than the desktop user.  One of those simple APIs the Vibration API.  The Vibration API allows developers to direct the device, using JavaScript, to vibrate in...

Incredible Demos

  • By
    JavaScript Copy to Clipboard

    "Copy to clipboard" functionality is something we all use dozens of times daily but the client side API around it has always been lacking; some older APIs and browser implementations required a scary "are you sure?"-style dialog before the content would be copied to clipboard -- not great for...

  • By
    Save Web Form Content Using Control + S

    We've all used word processing applications like Microsoft Word and if there's one thing they've taught you it's that you need to save every few seconds in anticipation of the inevitable crash. WordPress has mimicked this functionality within their WYSIWYG editor and I use it...

Discussion

  1. Šime Vidas

    It’s worth mentioning that these styles only apply on desktop. The buttons are not shown in Chrome on Android which is probably better that way since the buttons are so small.

  2. Jules

    We can improve it by not showing the arrows for elements with step=”any”, in which case the input arrows don’t do anything.

    /* ensures the increment/decrement arrows always display as long as step is not 'any' */
    input[type="number"]:not([step="any"])::-webkit-inner-spin-button,
    input[type="number"]:not([step="any"])::-webkit-outer-spin-button {
      opacity: 1;
    }
    

Wrap your code in <pre class="{language}"></pre> tags, link to a GitHub gist, JSFiddle fiddle, or CodePen pen to embed!