Why does <textarea> in React accept a value attribute but in HTML, it does not?

Question

Not sure if this is React specific, but, why does the following work in React and render some text to the element:

<textarea value="Some text."></textarea>

but the same in plain HTML does not:

<textarea value="Some text."></textarea>

maybe I am missing something or done something foolish? Apologies and thanks in advance!

Answer 1

In HTML the text area is a non-self-closing tag and has content. It defines its text by children.

textarea

<textarea id="story" name="story" rows="5" cols="33">
  It was a dark and stormy night...
</textarea>

In React it uses the value attribute. Note that is also self-closing and takes no children.

textarea tag

This keeps the textarea element consistent with other form elements such as input and select.

<textarea
  id="story"
  name="story"
  rows="5"
  cols="33"
  value="It was a dark and stormy night..."
/>