HTML provides text formatting tags that are used to emphasize or style text content.
These tags help highlight important words, add emphasis, and improve readability without changing the structure of the page.
Bold and Strong Text
The <b> tag makes text bold for visual styling.
The <strong> tag represents important text and has semantic meaning.
Use <strong> when the text is important or meaningful. Search engines and screen readers treat <strong> text differently than <b>.
Italic and Emphasized Text
The <i> tag is used for italic text for visual styling.
The <em> tag is used to emphasize text and has semantic importance.
The <em> tag indicates emphasis and is preferred when the text has meaning or stress in a sentence.
Underline and Small Text
The <u> tag underlines text.
The <small> tag displays smaller text, often used for disclaimers or notes.
Best Practices for Text Formatting
- Use semantic tags like <strong> and <em>
- Avoid overusing formatting tags
- Do not use formatting tags for layout
- Keep content readable and clean
Why Text Formatting Matters for Jobs
Professional websites require clean, readable, and meaningful content.
Correct use of text formatting improves accessibility, SEO, and user experience, which employers value highly.
Practice Task
Create a paragraph using <strong>, <em>, and <small> tags to highlight important information.
What You Will Learn Next
In the next lesson, you will learn about preformatted text and how to display content exactly as written.