mat-autocomplete auto-hide placeholder text on input focus

You can remove the placeholder in the input and add a mat-placeholder in the mat-form-field and custom the css with a class.

HTML file:

<form class="example-form">
  <mat-form-field floatLabel="never">
      <input 
        matInput 
        type="text" 
        aria-label="Number" 
        matInput [formControl]="myControl" 
        [matAutocomplete]  ="auto">

      <mat-placeholder class="placeholder">Search</mat-placeholder>

      <mat-autocomplete #auto="matAutocomplete">
        <mat-option *ngFor="let option of options" [value]="option">
          {{option}}
        </mat-option>
      </mat-autocomplete>
  </mat-form-field>
</form>

CSS file:

.mat-focused .placeholder {
    color: transparent;
}

.example-form {
  min-width: 150px;
  max-width: 500px;
  width: 100%;
}

.example-full-width {
  width: 100%;
}