Optional tags - HTML Explained | Tutorial

title: Optional Tags

In HTML5, you can omit certain opening and closing tags under specific conditions. For example, the following HTML code…

<!DOCTYPE html>
<p>Hello World.

Will automatically evaluate to…

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
  <head></head>
  <body>
    <p>Hello world.
    </p>
  </body>
</html>

The optional tag specifications for the most common HTML5 tags are as follows:

An html element’s start tag may be omitted if the first thing inside the html element is not a comment.
An html element’s end tag may be omitted if the html element is not immediately followed by a comment.
A head element’s start tag may be omitted if the element is empty, or if the first thing inside the head element is an element.
A head element’s end tag may be omitted if the head element is not immediately followed by a space character or a comment.
A body element’s start tag may be omitted if the element is empty, or if the first thing inside the body element is not a space character or a comment, except if the first thing inside the body element is a meta, link, script, style, or template element.
A body element’s end tag may be omitted if the body element is not immediately followed by a comment.

To learn more about the HTML5 optional tags, please visit The World Wide Web Consortium’s Recommendations.