Toni's answer is good, but I'd rather drop the ID and explicitly use "input", that way all inputs with placeholders get the behavior:

<input type="text" placeholder="your text" /> 

Note that $(function(){ }); is the shorthand for $(document).ready(function(){ });:

$(function(){ $('input').data('holder',$('input').attr('placeholder')); $('input').focusin(function(){ $(this).attr('placeholder',''); }); $('input').focusout(function(){ $(this).attr('placeholder',$(this).data('holder')); }); }) 

http://jsfiddle.net/dreamyguy/6CzRq/5/

Toni's answer is good, but I'd rather drop the ID and explicitly use input, that way all inputs with placeholder get the behavior:

<input type="text" placeholder="your text" /> 

Note that $(function(){ }); is the shorthand for $(document).ready(function(){ });:

$(function(){ $('input').data('holder',$('input').attr('placeholder')); $('input').focusin(function(){ $(this).attr('placeholder',''); }); $('input').focusout(function(){ $(this).attr('placeholder',$(this).data('holder')); }); }) 

Demo.