HTML Basic Tags
HTML tags are the fundamental elements of HTML used for defining the
structure of the document. These are letters or words enclosed by angle
brackets (< and >).
Usually, most of the HTML tags contain an opening and a closing tag. Each tag
has a different meaning, and the browser reads the tags and displays the
contents enclosed by them accordingly.
For example, if we wrap any text in the paragraph (<p></p>) tag, the browser
displays it as a separate paragraph. In this tutorial, we will discuss all the basic
tags in HTML.
Heading Tags
Heading tags are used to define headings of documents. You can use different
sizes for your headings. HTML also has six levels of headings, which use the
elements <h1>, <h2>, <h3>, <h4>, <h5>, and <h6>. While displaying any heading,
the browser adds one line before and one line after that heading.
Example
Following HTML code demonstrates various levels of headings:
Open Compiler
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Heading Example</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>This is heading 1</h1>
<h2>This is heading 2</h2>
<h3>This is heading 3</h3>
<h4>This is heading 4</h4>
<h5>This is heading 5</h5>
<h6>This is heading 6</h6>
</body>
</html>
Fullscreen
Paragraph Tag
The <p> tag offers a way to structure your text into different paragraphs. Each
paragraph of text should go in between an opening <p> and a closing </p>
tag.
Example
The following example demonstrates the use of paragraph (<p>) tag, here we
are defining 3 paragraphs −
Open Compiler
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Paragraph Example</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>Here is a first paragraph of text.</p>
<p>Here is a second paragraph of text.</p>
<p>Here is a third paragraph of text.</p>
</body>
</html>
Line Break Tag
Whenever you use the <br /> element, anything following it starts from the next
line. This tag is an example of an empty element, where you do not need
opening and closing tags, as there is nothing to go in between them.
The <br /> tag has a space between the characters br and the forward slash /. If
you omit this space, older browsers will have trouble rendering the line break,
while if you miss the forward slash character and just use <br>, it is not valid
in XHTML.
Example
The following example demonstrates the use of break (<br />) tag −
Open Compiler
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Line Break Example</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>Hello<br /> You delivered your assignment on time.<br />
Thanks<br /> Mahnaz</p>
</body>
</html>
Center Tag
The <center> tag aligns text, images, or other HTML elements in the middle of
a web page.
Note: The <center> tag is deprecated in HTML5. You can use the CSS text-align
property to center elements.
Example
The following example demonstrates the use of the <center> tag. Here, we are
displaying the second paragraph in center alignment:
Open Compiler
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Centering Content Example</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>This text is not in the center.</p>
<center>
<p>This text is in the center.</p>
</center>
</body>
</html>
Horizonal Rule Tag
The horizontal rule (<hr>) tag displays a horizonal line. A horizontal line visually
breaks up sections of a document. The <hr> tag creates a line from the current
position in the document to the right margin and breaks the line accordingly.
Example
The following example draws a horizontal line between two paragraphs −
Open Compiler
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Horizontal Line Example</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>This is paragraph one and should be on top</p>
<hr />
<p>This is paragraph two and should be at bottom</p>
</body>
</html>
On executing the above example, you can see a straight line dividing the two
paragraphs.
The <hr /> tag is an example of the empty element, where you do not need
opening and closing tags, as there is nothing to go in between them.
The <hr /> element has a space between the characters hr and the forward
slash. If you omit this space, older browsers will have trouble rendering the
horizontal line, while if you miss the forward slash character and just use <hr>,
it is not valid in XHTML.
Preserve Formatting Tag
The <pre> tag is used to preserve the formatting. Whenever you want to display
content on the webpage exactly in the same format as it was written in the
HTML document, you can use the <pre> tag. It preserves the formatting of
source code, including line breaks and indentation.
Example
The following example demonstrates the use of the <pre> tag. Here, we are
displaying some code that should keep the formatting exactly the same as it is
written inside the <pre> tag −
Open Compiler
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Preserve Formatting Example</title>
</head>
<body>
<pre>
function testFunction( strText ){
alert (strText)
}
</pre>
</body>
</html>
function testFunction( strText ){
alert (strText)
}
Non-breaking Spaces
Non-breaking spaces prevent an automatic line break and are displayed using
the entity.
Suppose if you want to use the phrase "12 Angry Men." Here, you would not
want a browser to split the "12, Angry" and "Men" across two lines −
An example of this technique appears in the movie "12 Angry Men."
In cases, where you do not want the client browser to break text, you should
use a nonbreaking space entity instead of a normal space. For example,
when coding the "12 Angry Men" in a paragraph, you should use something
similar to the following code −
Example
The following example demonstrates the use of entity −
Open Compiler
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Nonbreaking Spaces Example</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>An example of this technique appears in the movie "12 Angry Men."</p>
<p>An example of this technique appears in the movie "12 Angry
Men."</p>
</body>
</html>
On executing the above example, it will display the sentence: An example of this
technique appears in the movie "12 Angry Men." twice. Since we have added
3 " " characters between 12 and men, the second time, you can observe three
spaces.
Listing Tags
The <ul> and <ol> tags create the unordered and ordered listings, and to
display list items, the <li> tag is used.
Example
The following example demonstrates the use of listing tags −
Open Compiler
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Listing Tags Example</title>
</head>
<body>
<h2>Unordered list</h2>
<ul>
<li>Item 1</li>
<li>Item 2</li>
<li>Item 3</li>
</ul>
<h2>Ordered list</h2>
<ul>
<li>Item 1</li>
<li>Item 2</li>
<li>Item 3</li>
</ul>
</body>
</html>