<head> Tag Syntax

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<?xml-stylesheet type="text/xsl" href="/site-template.xsl"?>
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
   <head>
      ... metadata content ...
      <title>... text content ...</title>
      ...
   </head>
   <body>
      ... flow content ...
   </body>
</html>
Rules for coding the HTML head element

Make sure you understand the difference between a tag and element and are familiar with the definitions of namespace and other HTML terms.

  1. Code the head element for the head section as the first element in the content of the html element.
  2. Begin the head element with a starting <head> tag. The element name uses lower case letters and should be in the HTML namespace, which it will pick up automatically from the xmlns attribute on the <html> tag.
  3. Include a single, required title element inside the head element.
  4. Include any other optional head section content, such as <script> tags, <meta/> tags, <link> tags and <style> tags.
  5. End the head element with a matching </head> closing tag.
  6. After the head element, a body element is the only other non-whitespace content inside the html element.

<head> Tag Content Model

Contents of the <head>...</head> Element

The content of the head element is expected to be metadata content with some restrictions. Therefore, the following metadata elements can be coded between the starting <head> tag and the ending </head> tag:

HTML TagContent of <head>...</head> Element
<title> requireda single required title element with the title that is to appear in the browser's address bar
<base/>an optional base element
<command/>optional command element(s)
<link/>optional link element(s)
<meta/>optional meta element(s)
<noscript>optional noscript element(s)
<script>optional script element(s)
<style>optional style element(s)
<rdf:RDF>optional RDF element(s)
<!--comments-->possibly interspersed with HTML comments