How To Alt Tag For Images On Blogs

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Adding images to your website or social networking profile is a great way to spruce up your page. The HTML code for adding images is straightforward, and often one of the first lessons for an HTML novice.

Sample HTML for Inserting Images

1
Upload your image . There are many free image hosting services, such as Picasa Web Albums, Imgur, Flickr, or Photobucket. Read the terms carefully. Some services will reduce your image quality, or take down your image if too many people view it (since this uses up the host's bandwidth).
- Some blog-hosting services let you upload images using the blog administrator tools.
- If you have a paid web host, upload the image to your own site using an FTP service. Creating an "images" directory is recommended to keep your files organized.^[1]
- If you want to use an image on another website, ask the creator for permission. If she grants it, download the image, then upload the image to an image hosting site.
2
Open your HTML file. Open the HTML document for the web page where the image will be displayed.
- If you are trying to insert an image on a forum, you can type directly in the post. Many forums use a custom system instead of HTML. Ask for help from other forum-goers if this doesn't work.
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3
Begin with the img tag. Find the point in your HTML body where you'd like to insert an image. Write the tag <img> here. This is an empty tag, meaning it stands alone, with no closing tag. Everything you need to display your image will go inside the two angle brackets.
- <img>
4
Find the URL of your image. Visit the web page where your image is hosted. Right-click the image (control-click on Mac) and select "Copy Image Location." You can also click "View Image" to see the image alone on a page, then copy the URL in your address bar.
- If you uploaded the image to an images directory in your own website, link to it with /images/yourfilenamehere. If this doesn't work, the images directory is probably inside another folder. Move it up to the root directory.
5
Place the URL in a src attribute. As you may already know, HTML attributes go inside a tag to modify it. The src attribute is short for "source," and tells the browser where to look to find the image. Write src=" " and paste the image URL in between the quotation marks. Here's an example:
- <img src="http://www.exampleimagehost.com/my-cute-dog.jpg">
6
Add an alt attribute. Technically your HTML has everything it needs to display the image, but it's best to add an alt attribute as well. This tells the browser what text to display when the image fails to load. More importantly, this helps search engines figure out what your image is about, and lets screen readers describe the image to visually impaired visitors.^[2] Follow this example, changing the text inside the quotation marks:
- <img src="http://www.exampleimagehost.com/my-cute-dog.jpg" alt="my dog eating a tangerine">
- If the image is not important to the page content, include the alt attribute with no text (alt="").^[3]
7

Save your changes. Save the HTML file to your website. Visit the page you just edited, or refresh the page if you already had it open. You should now see your image. If it's the wrong size or you're unhappy with it for another reason, continue to the next section.

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1
Change the size of the image. For best results, resize the image using free editing software, then upload the new version. Setting the width and height using HTML tells the browser to shrink or expand the image, which can be inconsistent across browsers and (rarely) cause display errors.^[4] If you want a quick and serviceable adjustment, use this format:
- <img src="http://example.com/example.png" alt="display this" width=200 height=200> (Number of pixels, or the more phone-friendly "CSS pixels" in HTML5.) ^[5] ^[6]
- or <img src="http://example.com/example.png" width=100% height=10%> (Percentage of web page dimensions, or percentage of HTML element containing the image.)
- If you only enter one attribute (width or height), the browser should preserve the width:height ratio.
2
Add a tooltip. The title attribute can be used to add an additional comment or information about the image. For example, you can credit the artist here. In most cases, this text will be displayed when the visitor hovers the cursor over the image.
- <img src="http://example.com/example.png" title="Photograph by J. Godfrey">
3
Make it a link. To make an image that's also a link, insert the image tag inside the <a></a> hyperlink tag. Here's an example:
- <a href="http://www.urloflink.com"><img src="http://urlofimage.com/image.gif"></a>
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Question

I have an image on my computer. Can I insert it in HTML without uploading it to a website?

You can, but the image will still only be on your computer, and not visible by anyone else who visits your website. To do this, use the image's file path instead of a URL. To find the file path, use a browser's "Open File" function to open the image, then look at the address bar. It will say something like "C:\Users\wikihow\image.jpg"
Question

Does it have to be a jpg file when inserting images with HTML?

No. You can use any image file type unless the hosting website only allows certain file types.
Question

Should I resize the image before uploading, or can I just use the width and height attributes?

If you're downsizing a particularly large image, it's best to do that in image editing software before uploading. Your website visitor has to download the exact image you uploaded, even if it only ends up as a tiny thumbnail on his or her screen.
Question

How do I insert images without a link?

You can stop after following the steps till the end of Part 1. The steps in Part 2 are optional.
Question

The image used to show up but now I just see a blank box. What happened?

If the image is no longer available at the URL you referenced, it will not appear on your website. Most likely the site hosting the image either took it down or moved it to another page.
Question

What do I do when the image won't appear on the HTML website?

Pratham Vasisht

Community Answer

The host of the image probably changed its link, in which case you should find out its new link and change the link you have written in your HTML, save it, and reload your web page. The host might also have taken down the image, in which case you should find a different image.
Question

How do I insert an image?

The code for inserting an image in HTML is listed in this article. Please read it above.
Question

How do I replace the image if something happens to it?

Change the code you used to insert the previous image and add the code to replace it. After that, save it and reload in the web page.
Question

What kind of file types are required to insert an image?

You can use any image file type unless the hosting website only allows certain file types.
Question

Does this also work for users visiting my site?

Yes, as long as you are using one from the web or have an image from your computer.

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Keep a backup of the image on your computer, just in case.
Make sure the URL includes the picture's file format (.jpg, .gif, etc).
GIF images work well for logos or cartoons, whereas JPEG images work well for complex imagery such as photographs.
In most cases, you'll want to stick to images with the file formats .gif, .jpeg, .jpg, or .png.^[7] Other formats are unlikely to display correctly on all browsers.

Thanks for submitting a tip for review!

Do not "hotlink" by inserting the URL of another person's website. This uses up bandwidth on that person's site, without bringing any visitors to his page. Besides the bad etiquette, a hotlinked image will disappear if the linked site goes down. If the web host sees what you're doing, he can even change the image that appears on your site.^[8]