In HTML, <img> is the tag we use to place an image or a photograph on a web page.
That <img> tag has two required attributes: src, which gives the path to the image, and alt, which gives an alternative text for it. The alt attribute describes the image in case the image itself does not appear for any reason, a wrong path being the usual one.
<img src="/example-image.jpg" alt="This is where the description of the image goes">The alt attribute is required on the tag, yet plenty of people would rather leave it empty or write something that has nothing to do with the image.
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Most web designers pay little or no attention to alt text because they do not know how useful it is, and most web design or SEO courses fail to stress how much it matters.
In this Türk SEM article we will explain what alt text means, what it does, and how much it helps when you add an image to your web page. We will also point out a few things worth keeping in mind while you write alt text for your images.
We have kept it short, and it will get you to the right usage exactly.
What Is Alt Text?
Alt text is also called alternative text, or simply the alt attribute.
It is a concise, descriptive piece of text that describes an image accurately.
By default you do not see this text when you view a web page in a browser. Even so, the moment your visitor cannot see an image for any reason, the alt text becomes visible. It should be informative and descriptive enough to give the reader an idea of what the image is about and what it holds.
Say you have an image like this one:
Instead of a general word like Mountain or Lake, aim to be fully descriptive. The right usage is: “Helvadere lake with Hasandağı in the background”
<img src="/imgs/hasandagi.jpg" alt="Helvadere lake with Hasandağı in the background">Why Does Image Alt Text Matter?
Let us go over why we should add the alt attribute inside the <img> tag.
There are several more reasons to think about adding not merely plain alternative text to your images but descriptive, informative alternative text:
- When you have connection trouble or the path to your image was entered wrongly, your image may fail to load on your page. In that case the alt text value is shown in place of the image and tells your visitors what was there.
- Alt text lets an image be described in a way search engines can use to improve the SEO of your page. It gives search engines better information towards higher positions in the SERPs, which is to say that proper alt text helps your page rank higher.
- Visually impaired users with a screen reader can listen to the description of the image. Improving accessibility for people who cannot see the screen is what lets your visitor get full use of your site.
- When you want to link your image to another page or document, the alt text is used as the link text if the image cannot load.
Tips For Writing Good Alternative Text
There is a well-known saying: “If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing well.” Much the same holds while you write your alternative text: writing no alternative text is better than writing bad, irrelevant or meaningless alternative text.
A few tips to keep in mind as you write:
Describe the image accurately
The whole point of writing alt text is that it can stand in for the image.
For it to serve that purpose, it has to describe the image accurately and in a way the reader can picture.
A useful tip: write your alt text as though you were describing the image to someone who cannot see it.
Keep it short
At this point you might start thinking these alt texts should run to a paragraph, but that is not the right usage. In most cases we should always be looking for the best way to describe our images in six or seven words.
Keep in mind that screen readers can cut alt text off at around 125 characters, so staying inside that limit is best. Even so, you should always avoid using a single word as alt text.
Example usage: Helvadere Lake and Hasandağı seen from Helvadere Park
That describes the image fully in 53 characters. Even assuming a limit of 125 characters, we can usually get the description done in 60 to 70.
Use keywords, but do not stuff them
It is natural for your choice of keyword to be the first thing on your mind while you describe an image. But packing that image full of keywords is not the right move.
Having your keywords in your alt text does help your page rank higher, yet remember that search engines treat unhelpful or bad alt text as a problem.
Wrong usage: Half Dome, Yosemite Valley, California, USA, Mountain, Park, Lake Photo
All this means is that you should use images that genuinely strengthen the standing of your page, and use only the most important keywords to describe them.
Do not repeat yourself
Avoid repetition entirely. Why would you use your page heading, or its title, as alt text? Leaving it empty is usually better than repeating captions or the text of the page.
Our best advice here: when you cannot describe an image well, leave the alternative text empty rather than dropping in some random text, or use the image caption as the repeated alternative text.
Image captions and alt text
It is easy to mix up captions and alternative text, or to repeat what is in your alternative text as the caption.
Captions describe images to help readers connect them to the surrounding text; alternative text explains the information in an image, or describes an image for screen reader users.
A caption does not have to match what the image shows word for word; it explains how the image relates to the text or the content it sits in.
Do not put the words ‘image’ or ‘photo’ in it
When you use the alt attribute on an image tag, search engines already know this is an image, so there is no need for the words image, picture or photo in your alt text.
It is good, though, to help people grasp the context or what kind of picture it is. You can say headshot, illustration, screenshot, chart and so on.
Writing Alt Text With AI
- The Rank Math SEO plugin describes photographs with AI as part of the plugin itself.
- Alt Text AI writes AI-assisted text automatically for every photograph you upload, with nothing for you to do. I have used it on a few projects and can say it works well.
Wrapping Up
In this Türk SEM article we went through alt text, a subject that gets far less coverage than it deserves, and we published an Alt Text tool alongside it. If you have read this far you now know what alt text means and why it matters. You also know a few important tips on how to use it when you add an image to your page.
One last thing worth remembering: you should always add alternative text to every image you use on your site, your logo and images used as buttons included, and you should know why you are doing it.
But do not forget that images which are part of the site design, whose first purpose is decoration rather than carrying information, do not need alt text.
Thank you for reading. We pass on a great deal of valuable SEO knowledge for free. Follow our articles to build your own skills, and use the tools our SEO specialists use at no cost.
