html5 input size,html - Input size vs width - Stack Overflow

I want to say this goes against the "conventional wisdom", but I generally prefer to use size. The reason for this is precisely the reason that many people say not to: the width of the field will vary from browser to browser, depending on font size. Specifically, it will always be large enough to display the specified number of characters, regardless of browser settings.

For example, if I have a date field, I typically want the field wide enough to display either 8 or 10 characters (two digit month and day and either two or four digit year, with separators). Setting the size attribute essentially guarantees me that the entire date will be visible, with minimal wasted space. Similarly for most numbers - I know the range of values expected, so I'll set the size attribute to the proper number of digits, plus decimal point if applicable.

As far as I can tell, no CSS attribute does this. Setting a width in em, for example, is based off the height, not the width, and thus is not very precise if you want to display a known number of characters.

Of course, this logic doesn't always apply - a name entry field, for example, could contain any number of characters. In those cases I'll fall back to CSS width properties, typically in px. However, I would say the majority of fields I make have some sort of known content, and by specifying the size attribute I can make sure that most of the content, in most cases, is displayed without clipping.