Alt tags are an essential aspect of web accessibility and SEO. They provide textual descriptions of images, helping search engines understand the content of your website and making it accessible to visually impaired users who rely on screen readers.

In this blog post, we’ll give you a clear definition of alt tags, real examples of their use in HTML code, and a detailed breakdown of use cases.

What Are Alt Tags?

Alt tags are short, descriptive phrases that describe an image’s content or function. They’re added to the HTML code of your web page within the img tag, using the alt attribute. Alt tags are crucial for both SEO and accessibility because they:

  1. Help search engines index and understand the content of images on your website.
  2. Provide a description of images for screen reader users, making your website accessible to people with visual impairments.

Real Examples of Alt Tag Code

Here are a few examples of how to use alt tags in HTML code:

Basic example of an alt tag:

<img src="cute-kitten.jpg" alt="A cute kitten playing with a ball of yarn" />

A logo with a relevant alt tag:

<img src="your-logo.png" alt="Your Company Name Logo" />

Use Cases for Alt Tags

Describing Images for Accessibility

For visually impaired users, screen readers rely on alt tags to communicate the content of images on a web page. When you use descriptive and relevant alt tags, you’re ensuring that your website is accessible to all users, regardless of their ability to see images.

Improving SEO

Search engines like Google can’t directly understand the content of an image, but they can read alt tags. By including alt tags with relevant keywords, you help search engines index your images, boosting your website’s visibility in search results. This can lead to more organic traffic and better search rankings.

Providing Context for Broken Images

If an image fails to load, the alt tag will be displayed in its place, providing context for the missing image. This can help users understand the intended content even when the image isn’t visible.

Enhancing Social Media Sharing

Some social media platforms, like Twitter and LinkedIn, use alt tags when generating link previews. By including relevant and engaging alt tags, you can improve the visibility and click-through rates of your shared content on social media.