HTML Guides for experimental

The controlslist attribute was proposed to give developers a way to hint to the browser which default media controls to show or hide. It accepts values like nodownload, nofullscreen, and noremoteplayback, allowing you to selectively disable specific buttons in the browser’s built-in media player UI. For example, controlslist="nodownload" hides the download button on the video player.

However, this attribute was never adopted into the WHATWG HTML Living Standard or any W3C specification. It remains a Chromium-specific feature, meaning it only works in browsers like Chrome and Edge. Firefox, Safari, and other non-Chromium browsers simply ignore it. Because it’s not part of any standard, the W3C HTML Validator rightfully reports it as an invalid attribute.

While using controlslist won’t break your page — browsers that don’t recognize it will silently ignore it — relying on non-standard attributes has downsides:

• Standards compliance: Your HTML won’t validate, which can mask other real issues in validation reports.
• Browser compatibility: The behavior only works in Chromium-based browsers, giving an inconsistent experience across browsers.
• Future uncertainty: Non-standard attributes can be removed or changed without notice.

To fix this, you have a few options. The simplest is to remove the attribute entirely if the customization isn’t critical. If you need fine-grained control over media player buttons, the most robust approach is to build custom media controls using JavaScript and the HTMLMediaElement API. For the specific case of disabling remote playback, there is a standardized attribute — disableremoteplayback — that you can use instead.

Examples

❌ Invalid: Using the non-standard controlslist attribute

<video src="video.mp4" controls controlslist="nodownload nofullscreen"></video>

The validator will report: Attribute “controlslist” not allowed on element “video” at this point.

✅ Valid: Removing the attribute

<video src="video.mp4" controls></video>

The simplest fix is to remove controlslist and accept the browser’s default controls.

✅ Valid: Using custom controls with JavaScript

<video id="my-video" src="video.mp4"></video>
<div class="custom-controls">
  <button id="play-btn">Play</button>
  <input id="seek-bar" type="range" min="0" max="100" value="0">
  <button id="fullscreen-btn">Fullscreen</button>
</div>
<script>
  const video = document.getElementById("my-video");
  document.getElementById("play-btn").addEventListener("click", () => {
    video.paused ? video.play() : video.pause();
  });
</script>

By omitting the controls attribute and building your own UI, you have full control over which buttons appear — across all browsers.

✅ Valid: Using disableremoteplayback for that specific need

<video src="video.mp4" controls disableremoteplayback></video>

If your goal was specifically controlslist="noremoteplayback", the standardized disableremoteplayback attribute achieves the same result and is valid HTML.

Audio element

The same issue and solutions apply to the <audio> element:

<!-- ❌ Invalid -->

<audio src="song.mp3" controls controlslist="nodownload"></audio>

<!-- ✅ Valid -->

<audio src="song.mp3" controls></audio>