[iOS, Mac, Windows] Fixed CharacterSpacing for SearchBar text and placeholder text

[Dhivya-SF4094]

Note

Are you waiting for the changes in this PR to be merged?
It would be very helpful if you could test the resulting artifacts from this PR and let us know in a comment if this change resolves your issue. Thank you!

Issue Detail

The CharacterSpacing property in SearchBar behaves inconsistently across platforms:

1. iOS/macOS: Not applied to search text or placeholder—both use default spacing.
2. Windows: Applied to search text, but placeholder still shows default spacing.

Root Cause

iOS: The CharacterSpacing logic for SearchBar is defined in UpdateCharacterSpacing() in TextFieldExtensions.cs, shared across Entry, Editor, and SearchBar.

For Entry and Editor, it's triggered via MapFormatting(), which is called from MapText() (e.g., in Entry.iOS), ensuring spacing is applied on load and text change.
For SearchBar, MapFormatting() was not invoked, so CharacterSpacing was never applied to either the search text or placeholder.

Windows - The CharacterSpacing property of the SearchBar is applied only to the search text via the AutoSuggestBox.CharacterSpacing property. However, the placeholder text is rendered by a separate internal TextBlock that does not inherit this spacing, resulting in default character spacing for the placeholder.

Description of Change

iOS: The fix involves explicitly calling MapFormatting() within the MapText() method of SearchBar.iOS.

Windows: The fix explicitly locates the TextBlock rendering the placeholder using GetFirstDescendant() and applies the same CharacterSpacing to it within the OnLoaded lifecycle of the AutoSuggestBox. This ensures that both search text and placeholder text reflect the correct spacing consistently.

Validated the behaviour in the following platforms

• Android
• Windows
• iOS
• Mac

Issues Fixed:

Fixes #30366

Screenshots

	Before	After
PlaceHolder Text
SearchBar Text

[dotnet-policy-service]

Hey there @@Dhivya-SF4094! Thank you so much for your PR! Someone from the team will get assigned to your PR shortly and we'll get it reviewed.

[jsuarezruiz]

/azp run MAUI-UITests-public

[azure-pipelines]

Azure Pipelines successfully started running 1 pipeline(s).

[jsuarezruiz]

The added snapshots contains the cursor. Because is blinking, the test could randomly fail. Could you update the test to remove the cursor?
Use:

maui/src/Controls/tests/TestCases.HostApp/Controls/UITestSearchBar.cs

Line 10 in effda77

public static readonly BindableProperty IsCursorVisibleProperty =

[Dhivya-SF4094]

The added snapshots contains the cursor. Because is blinking, the test could randomly fail. Could you update the test to remove the cursor? Use:

maui/src/Controls/tests/TestCases.HostApp/Controls/UITestSearchBar.cs

Line 10 in effda77

public static readonly BindableProperty IsCursorVisibleProperty =

@jsuarezruiz Updated the test sample to set IsCursorVisible to false using the UITestSearchBar.IsCursorVisibleProperty

[jsuarezruiz]

/azp run MAUI-UITests-public

[azure-pipelines]

Azure Pipelines successfully started running 1 pipeline(s).