diff --git a/Userland/Libraries/LibWeb/HTML/HTMLInputElement.cpp b/Userland/Libraries/LibWeb/HTML/HTMLInputElement.cpp
index 6aaeee35ca7..318f7239c3a 100644
--- a/Userland/Libraries/LibWeb/HTML/HTMLInputElement.cpp
+++ b/Userland/Libraries/LibWeb/HTML/HTMLInputElement.cpp
@@ -689,7 +689,7 @@ String HTMLInputElement::placeholder() const
 }
 
 // https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/input.html#attr-input-placeholder
-Optional<ByteString> HTMLInputElement::placeholder_value() const
+Optional<String> HTMLInputElement::placeholder_value() const
 {
     if (!m_text_node || !m_text_node->data().is_empty())
         return {};
@@ -697,7 +697,7 @@ Optional<ByteString> HTMLInputElement::placeholder_value() const
         return {};
     if (!has_attribute(HTML::AttributeNames::placeholder))
         return {};
-    return placeholder().to_byte_string();
+    return placeholder();
 }
 
 void HTMLInputElement::create_shadow_tree_if_needed()
diff --git a/Userland/Libraries/LibWeb/HTML/HTMLInputElement.h b/Userland/Libraries/LibWeb/HTML/HTMLInputElement.h
index b3a39429ff6..3f2a5f3f57a 100644
--- a/Userland/Libraries/LibWeb/HTML/HTMLInputElement.h
+++ b/Userland/Libraries/LibWeb/HTML/HTMLInputElement.h
@@ -79,7 +79,7 @@ public:
     void commit_pending_changes();
 
     String placeholder() const;
-    Optional<ByteString> placeholder_value() const;
+    Optional<String> placeholder_value() const;
 
     bool checked() const { return m_checked; }
     enum class ChangeSource {