Manual check flagged an incorrect tab order

What’s wrong

This finding comes from a manual keyboard walkthrough in the RedFlag extension, someone tabbed through the page and marked this point as where the tab order stopped making sense.

Why it matters

Automated tools can’t judge whether a tab sequence “makes sense” visually, that’s why this is a manual check. A tab order that jumps around unpredictably forces keyboard users to guess where focus went next.

How to fix it

Match the DOM order to the visual reading order, top to bottom, left to right. Avoid tabindex values greater than 0, they override natural order and are almost always the root cause.

<input tabindex="3" placeholder="Email">
<input tabindex="1" placeholder="Name">
<input tabindex="2" placeholder="Phone">

<input placeholder="Name">
<input placeholder="Phone">
<input placeholder="Email">

Learn more

• WCAG Understanding 2.4.3
• MDN: tabindex