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Disable Autocomplete for Gravity Forms

Disable autocomplete for your Gravity Forms with this copy-and-paste snippet.

Last updated | Written by 69 Comments

  • January 21, 2020: Updated snippet to be simpler and more aggressive.

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Overview

In my experience, autocomplete is generally more helpful than harmful but there are times when it just gets in the way. For those times, use this handy snippet to disable this feature.

  1. Overview
  2. Using the Snippet
  3. Autocomplete in Gravity Forms.
  4. How autocomplete works in different browsers.

Using the Snippet

Confirm that you have Gravity Forms installed and activated and that you’ve installed the snippet. Once you have installed the snippet, you’re good to go! This one’s plug and play!

This snippet will apply to all forms and all fields. If you’d like to only apply this to specific forms and/or specific fields, let us know in the comments.

Autocomplete in Gravity Forms.

By default, Gravity Forms outputs HTML5 fields. The HTML5 spec offers a framework for labeling fields so the browser can automatically complete forms with previously-entered information. In short, you don’t have to do anything for Gravity Forms to activate autocomplete on your forms.

There is an option in Gravity Forms’ Settings that allows you disable HTML5 output. This will disable autocomplete for those fields, but we don’t recommend it. Disabling HTML5 also removes many other useful features, such as automatically displaying a different mobile keyboard when a Phone or Email field is selected. Instead, you can use this snippet to only disable autocomplete while keeping the rest of the HTML5 goodies.

How autocomplete works in different browsers.

Autocomplete behavior differs between browsers. While HTML5 standards dictate how autocomplete should work in general, it leaves some room for interpretation. Browser manufacturers use slightly different implementations for triggering autocomplete, and while the user experience is mostly identical, the technical differences create a situation where a one-size-fits-all solution for disabling autocomplete isn’t possible.

The spec itself states that the autocomplete attribute can be added to any input, select, or textarea to change the autocomplete behavior of those fields. It furthers states that the use of the off value should disable autocomplete for that field. This works in many browsers, but not all. Below is a breakdown of how different autocomplete values are interpreted by different browsers.

offWorks in all browsers except Chrome. Chrome ignores autocomplete="off" for fields that it detects as requesting personal information (i.e. fields with labels like Name, Phone, or Address). It does respect off to non-personal-information fields.
passwordWorks in Chrome to completely disable autocomplete. Does not work in other browsers.

Because of the different behaviors in browsers, our snippet does a quick User Agent check to determine what browser is loading the form. It then assigns the appropriate autocomplete value for that particular browser. In our testing, autocomplete is disabled in all browsers on both desktop and mobile.

Find a browser where autocomplete is still active with the snippet installed? Drop us a line.

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Comments

    • David Smith says

      You’ll want to update the filter names to gform_form_tag_123 and gform_field_content_123 respectively, where 123 is your form ID.

  5. Lee Fuller says

    Something I’ve noticed. If you turn off the “Enable Locator button” option, the code no longer functions. Turning it back on makes it work again.

    Just fyi.

    Reply

    • Lee Fuller says

      Interesting.. when I add another single text field, it stops working. Even if I add a specific form and field.

    • David Smith says

      Hi Mart, same snippet but update the filter name to target your form and field: gform_field_content_FORMID_FIELDID.

    • ben Horle says

      So where does this bit go please? I need to disable it on feild 9, on form 8. So how can I do that please? Also when the time comes, how would I then ad additional fields on other forms please? field: gform_field_content_FORMID_FIELDID. ‘, ‘ autocomplete=”off”>’, $form_tag ); } return $form_tag; } add_filter( ‘gform_field_content’, ‘gform_form_input_autocomplete’, 11, 5 ); function gform_form_input_autocomplete( $input, $field, $value, $lead_id, $form_id ) { if ( is_admin() ) return $input; if ( GFFormsModel::is_html5_enabled() ) { $input = preg_replace( ‘/<(input|textarea)/', '

  7. Dave F says

    I got google Chrome to NOT do autofill by making the following changes to the code provided:

    1) Removed the HTML5 condition for the code

    2) Changed autocomplete=off to autcomplete=something-new per the recommendations I found here: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/47775041/disable-autofill-in-chrome-63

    FYI, that Stack Overflow link/lead was provided in a different comment.

    Anyway, now it’s working for me the way I want. If there are any disadvantages to removing the HTML5 condition for the code, let me know, but so far so good.

    I’m pasting the code I’m using in the “Code” box, since it’s not allowed in the comment section.

    Reply

  10. Dave says

    Hi, I am interested in using this code in my theme to disable Auto Complete in my Gravity Forms but the theme’s function file is limited and states not to enter any coding in it. Is there an alternative way please?

    Thank you

    Reply

  11. Sam Mitzmann says

    Hey David, How can I use this feature for specific fields in a form? It is necessary in conjunction with Auto-complete perk so that the browser auto-fill does not interfere with that function (especially on mobile). Alternatively to automatically disable browser auto-fill for all fields where auto-complete perk is active.

    Reply

  13. Cieran says

    Any way this could be modified for autocapitalize? And preferably to turn off autocapitalize AND autocomplete for a specific field (like email address, especially for mobile users)?

    Reply

  14. Sam says

    Is there a way to disable autocomplete for a field type (like the date field) or for a specific field in a specific form?

    Reply

    • David Smith says

      We don’t have a ready solution for this but thanks for the suggestion. We’ll see if other users need this too and update the article accordingly.

    • Marnick says

      Is there a solution for this? I need it too. As soon as you click in the box of the date field, I got all kind of auto fill options that has nothing to do with a date. Because of the list, it is hard to actually see the calendar too. Weird that there are not a lot more people having this issue.

    • David Smith says

      Hi Marnick, this snippet should work for Date fields, but it will also work for all other fields. If you find that it isn’t working, feel free to share a URL where I can see the issue.

  16. Grant says

    Hi Jordan/David,

    I hope this message finds you! I put the code into the functions.php, enabled HTML5, but it doesn’t seem to be working for me. Anything I can do to get this to work? I’m using the following versions:

    PHP Version 5.3.29 MySQL Version 5.1.56 WordPress Version 4.2.2 Gravity Forms Version 1.9.9

    Thanks!

    Reply

    • David Smith says

      This article is for browser-powered auto complete where previously submitted data is saved by the browser and then suggested to the user when they begin to type into fields. Similarly, you can override the default auto-complete with your own and provide your own data to auto-suggest. I have a perk in the works which you can see here:

      http://www.screencast.com/t/RFsnB5xrg

      If you’d like to give this perk a try, pick up a copy of Gravity Perks and drop me a line via the support form requesting access to this unreleased perk.

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Disable Autocomplete for Gravity Forms