Description

The HTML element <head> is used to define the head section of an HTML document, which is used to define the document's metadata.

It must be the first child of the <html> element and must be defined only once.

Though the <head> element is optional, it is always suggested to define and include required metadata.

Here is a list of all the elements that the head section can contain.

  • Element <title> defines the document title
  • Element <base> defines the document base URL that will be used to resolve all the reference URLs
  • Element <meta> defines metadata
  • Element <link> defines relationship with external resources linked
  • Element <style> defines styles for the specific document level
  • Element <script> defines scripts for the specific document level
  • Element <noscript> defines alternative content to be displayed on browsers that doesn't support scripts or scripts diabled.

The below table summarizes its usage.

Usage Details
Placement It must be the first child of <html> element.
Contents It can contain the elements <title>, <base>, <meta>, <link>, <style>, <script>, <noscript>.
Tags Both opening and closing tags are required.
Versions HTML 2, 3.2, 4, 4.01, 5

Syntax

Here is the basic syntax of the <head> element.

<head>...</head>

Examples

In the below example, the <head> element is used to define the head section.

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
        <!-- Document head goes here -->
</head>
<body>
        <!-- Document body goes here -->
</body>
</html>

Attributes

The following table shows the list of supported and unsupported attributes for the <head> tag.

Attribute Type Details
Element-Specific Attributes The tag <head> has some element-specific attributes listed in the below table.
Global Attributes Like all other HTML tags, the tag <head> supports the HTML Global Attributes.
Event Attributes The tag <head> also supports the HTML Event Attributes.

Here is a list of attributes that are specific to the <head> element.

Attribute Value Description
profile URL Obsolete and not to be used.
Specifies the location of one or more metadata profiles with a white space between them.

Browser Compatibility

The tag <head> is supported in all modern browsers.

  • Google Chrome 1+
  • Internet Explorer or Edge 2+
  • Firefox 1+
  • Apple Safari 1+
  • Opera 2.1+

Related Links