HTML (HyperText Markup Language)

/ ˌāCH ˌtē ˌem ˈel /

Definition

HTML defines the layout of any webpage you’ve visited. You can think of HTML as Microsoft Word. It provides a list of elements (i.e. headers, titles, pictures, bullet points, footers, etc.) to structure your page. The only difference is HTML requires you to type out the element you want to use. For example, here is a comparison between two HTML and Word documents producing the same content:

HTML

Word Document

Since the content is the same in both documents, try finding the differences between the two. You’ll notice that Word gives you all the elements through their UI and they just work. With HTML, like any coding language, we must explicitly type out the element for it to just work.

HTML allows us to use Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and JavaScript (JS) — two crucial ingredients when building an interactive and visually-stunning website. Since HTML is simply a type of file (similar to how Word documents have .doc file extensions), it can be used for more than just websites. This email you’re reading was built using HTML and CSS!

Used in a sentenceExample 1: designer portfolioPM: How did you build out your portfolio? It looks nice.Designer: I designed it in Figma and just exported it as an HTML file. 

Related terms

• JavaScript

• CSS

• Frontend

• DOM