A clear error message for wrong password format

Question

In my sign up form for a website, I display a message belows the password field form.:

<em class="help-block">A minimum 8 characters password contains a combination of <strong>uppercase and lowercase letter</strong> and <strong>number</strong>.</em>

And if the participant still didn't match the password requirement, there'll be an error message:

A minimum 8 characters password contains a combination of uppercase and lowercase letter and number are required.

So far, there were 12 sign-up, but there were 2 participants failed and didn't understand this message, and complain about it.

FYI, this website's target audience were for international academics and professionals in chemistry, that's why the website is using English. I don't have any information where the participant who had this error were coming from.

Is there a more appropriate and clear error message that I can use in English?

Answer 1

I would recommend writing it in clear requirements and state which requirement is not fulfilled by the user. Such as

Your password must be have at least

• 8 characters long
• 1 uppercase & 1 lowercase character
• 1 number

While the user types the password, you can mark as done the requirements, something like the following example.

Answer 2

A minimum 8 characters password contains a combination of uppercase and lowercase letter and number are required.

That error message sounds awkward and confusing because it's written in a passive voice. It's also wrong grammatically.

I'd change it to something like this:

Your password must be at least 8 characters long, contain at least one number and have a mixture of uppercase and lowercase letters.