Bug 272584 – Radio buttons are not focusable in tab order or by clicking

• Status: RESOLVED
• Resolution: WORKSFORME
• Component: DOM

[Robert Flack]

Radio buttons seem to be unfocusable (neither in tab order nor by clicking). As an example you can try navigating to this simple test page:

https://output.jsbin.com/rivifuj

Try to tab to the radio button. I would expect it to be focused after the first input field (as it is on Chrome or Firefox) but on Safari 17.4.1. it is skipped over. I've noticed that some of my colleagues can reproduce this and some can't (on the same version of Safari).

[Alexey Proskuryakov]

This behavior depends on system and Safari preferences (as Full Keyboard Access or Keyboard Navigation; arguably it could be made more streamlined). When these preferences are off, one can use Option+Tab to tab to controls.

This is standard macOS behavior, which we will not be diverging from.

[Robert Flack]

Thanks, the system preferences don't follow the interaction pattern in https://www.w3.org/WAI/ARIA/apg/patterns/radio/, instead stopping at every option but I see option+tab / option+shift+tab do. Sorry for the noise.

[Robert Flack]

For posterity, the setting in Safari is in

Safari > Settings > Advanced > Accessibility > Press Tab to highlight each item on a webpage.

This does make Tab / Shift + Tab match the ARIA pattern and the other browsers, but as noted this does deviate from the macOS behavior.

[James Craig]

> Thanks, the system preferences don't follow the interaction pattern […], instead stopping at every option.

FWIW, the radio buttons in System Prefs > Appearance (the two scrollbar related groups) do behave the same as Safari for me (one tab per group), once the relevant keyboard settings are applied. 

If you're seeing a different behavior in other standard radio buttons, and you have enabled Sys Prefs > Keyboard > Keyboard navigation, please share more about the unexpected behavior.

[Miriam Suzanne]

I don't have any of the mentioned settings turned on in either the OS accessibility keyboard preferences, or the Safari advanced accessibility preferences – but I am able to tab in and out of radio groups with the keyboard (without holding option or any other modifier).