HTML Elements
An HTML element is an individual component of an HTML document or web page, once this has been parsed into the Document Object Model. HTML is composed of a tree of HTML nodes, such as text nodes. Each node can have HTML attributes specified. Nodes can also have content, including other nodes and text.
An HTML element usually consists of a start tag and end tag, with the content inserted in between:
<tagname>Content goes here...</tagname>
The HTML element is everything from the start tag to the end tag:
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
| Start tag | Element content | End tag |
|---|---|---|
| <h1> | My First Heading | </h1> |
| My first paragraph.</p> | ||
| <br> |
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NESTED HTML ELEMENTS
If you look at the HTML markup for any webpage today, you will see HTML elements contained within other HTML elements. These elements that are "inside" of other are what are known as "nested elements", and they are essential to building any web page today.
EXAMPLE
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<body>
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
</body>
</html>
RESULT:
My First Heading
My first paragraph.
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EXAMPLE EXPLAINED
The <html> element defines the whole document.
It has a start tag <html> and an end tag </html>.
The element content is another HTML element (the <body> element).
EXAMPLE
<html>
<body>
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
</body>
</html>
<body>
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
</body>
</html>
The <body> element defines the document body.
It has a start tag <body> and an end tag </body>.
The element content is two other HTML elements (<h1> and <p>).
<body>
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
</body>
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
</body>
The <h1> element defines a heading.
It has a start tag <h1> and an end tag </h1>.
The element content is: My First Heading.
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
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Do NOT FORGET THE END TAG
Some HTML elements will display correctly, even if you forget the end tag:
EXAMPLE
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<body>
<p>This is a paragraph.
<p>This is a paragraph.
</body>
</html>
RESULT:
This is a paragraph.This is a paragraph.
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Empty HTML Elements
HTML elements with no content are called empty elements.
<br> is an empty element without a closing tag (the <br> tag defines a line break).
Empty elements can be "closed" in the opening tag like this: <br />.
HTML5 does not require empty elements to be closed. But if you want stricter validation, or if you need to make your document readable by XML parsers, you must close all HTML elements properly.
USE LOWERCASE TAGS
HTML tags are not case sensitive: <P> means the same as <p>.
The HTML5 standard does not require lowercase tags, but W3C recommends lowercase in HTML, and demands lowercase for stricter document types like XHTML.
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