Inspect webkit-input-placeholder with developer tools

Question

It's possible to style a text input's placeholder with the following:

-webkit-input-placeholder {
    color: red;
}

I am looking at a website online and I would like to use the same placeholder color as they do. Is it possible to figure out what color they used? I would like to include any alpha values, so I can't just sample the color with an image editor.

When I inspect the element with Chrome Dev Tools, I see:

Dev tools does not provide information regarding the placeholder element when inspecting the input element. Is there another way?

Legislative

possible duplicate of How to change placeholder color on focus? – Interpolation

No... I clearly state in the question that I am aware of how to change it, but that I am wondering how to inspect the properties of another person's. I even provide a code sample showing I know how to change it. – Legislative

what's the website? Since placeholder is a pseudo-element, you should still be able to see the styles when inspecting that element. – Interpolation

Answer 1

I figured it out.

The trick is to enable 'Show user agent shadow DOM' in the Settings panel of Chrome Developer Tools:

To get to settings, click the Gear icon at the top right of your Dev Tools panel, then make sure Preferences tab on the left-hand side is selected, find the Elements heading, and check "Show user agent shadow DOM" checkbox below that heading.

With that, you can now see it:

Legislative

The setting is there in 62 and it works beautifully. – Gurule

Chrome 67 and your solution applies as well – Religionism

@Religionism I use Chrome 67 as well, but can't find this option. Can u please in which tab it is located now? – Doxia

Anyone know how to see the ::placeholder pseudo-element that's broadly supported now? – Around

@Around the workflow mentioned in this answer lets you inspect ::placeholder. See this related answer. – Scum

In case you can't find the 'Settings' menu item under the"⋮" button, there's a cogwheel ⚙️ just to the left of it :) – Orator

It has moved to Settings > Preferences > Elements > [_] Show user agent shadow DOM – Reclinate

Why isn't it enabled in Chrome by default? – Doxia

After Settings > Preferences > Elements is checked, I found to display the -webkit properties it was required to drill down in the Elements window before all the pseudo elements were exposed along with their properties in the styles pane. Thank you for this post, very helpful! – Geology

Answer 2

1. For Google Chrome Version 69:
2. Open Inspect Elements: On Mac ⌘ + Shift + C, on Windows / Linux Ctrl + Shift + C OR F12.
3. Click the "⋮" button at the top right then Go to settings
4. In settings click on Preferences > Click on Show user agent Shadow DOM

The below images show the process:

Go to settings > Preferences:

Click on Show user agent Shadow DOM:

View the CSS of placeholder:

Crupper

Thanks! I was looking in Chrome settings I couldn't find it. Apparently, it is in the Dev Tools Settings. – Jagged

Isn't the same 4 years old answer from Sean Anderson of 4 years ago? – Selry