With our "Try it Yourself" editor, you can edit the HTML code and view the result:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Page Title</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>This is a Heading</h1>
<p>This is a paragraph.</p>
</body>
</html>
HTML stands for Hyper Text Markup Language
HTML is the standard markup language for creating Web pages
HTML describes the structure of a Web page
HTML consists of a series of elements
HTML elements tell the browser how to display the content
HTML elements label pieces of content such as "this is a heading", "this is a paragraph", "this is a link", etc.
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Page Title</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
</body>
</html>
The <!DOCTYPE html> declaration defines that this document is an HTML5 document
The <html> element is the root element of an HTML page
The <head> element contains meta information about the HTML page
The <title> element specifies a title for the HTML page (which is shown in the browser's title bar or in the page's tab)
The <body> element defines the document's body, and is a container for all the visible contents, such as headings, paragraphs, images, hyperlinks, tables, lists, etc.
The <h1> element defines a large heading
The <p> element defines a paragraph
An HTML element is defined by a start tag, some content, and an end tag:
<tagname> Content goes here... </tagname>
The HTML element is everything from the start tag to the end tag:
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
The purpose of a web browser (Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Safari) is to read HTML documents and display them correctly.
A browser does not display the HTML tags, but uses them to determine how to display the document:
Below is a visualization of an HTML page structure:
<html>
<head>
<title>Page title</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>This is a heading</h1>
<p>This is a paragraph.</p>
<p>This is another paragraph.</p>
</body>
Web pages can be created and modified by using professional HTML editors.
However, for learning HTML we recommend a simple text editor like Notepad (PC) or TextEdit (Mac).
We believe that using a simple text editor is a good way to learn HTML.
Follow the steps below to create your first web page with Notepad or TextEdit.
Windows 8 or later:
Open the Start Screen (the window symbol at the bottom left on your screen). Type Notepad.
Windows 7 or earlier:
Open Start > Programs > Accessories > Notepad
Open Finder > Applications > TextEdit
Also change some preferences to get the application to save files correctly. In Preferences > Format > choose "Plain Text"
Then under "Open and Save", check the box that says "Display HTML files as HTML code instead of formatted text".
Then open a new document to place the code.
Write or copy the following HTML code into Notepad:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<body>
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
</body>
</html>