HTML validation is an important process where you want to be sure that your web page is error-free by using a program or an online service. In addition, HTML validation ensures that your web page complies with the W3 Consortium standards and receives constructive criticism and suggestions.
Many webmasters have the opportunity to put their web sites into HTML validation and many opt to skip this part. In this day and age, is HTML validation still important? It was significant then, and it should still be important now. After all, it is your web site and it will benefit from the validation results and suggestions.
Here are the top reasons why you should validate your HTML codes and CSS:
- Promotes Cross-Platform and Cross-Browser Compatibility
Your web page might appear fine on your favourite browser, but there might be some issues with the HTML or CSS codes on other browsers. It is also possible that other people using a different version of the same browser will show a broken web page or some elements not appearing where they should be.
Validation will ensure that your code is optimized to work on all browsers and all operating systems. It will also safeguard your web page in future versions of all browsers since they are geared towards compatibility to older versions.
- Produces More Search Engine Visibility
When your web-page has been validated to be error-free, search engines can process your site without disputes and can show all parts of your pages. Errors tend to make browsers compensate by ignoring broken elements which could be detrimental to the “spidering” of search engines. Your keywords might be skipped due to errors found on your web page. To avoid such problems, ensure that all your HTML and CSS codes do not contain any error.
- Promotes Professionalism
When there are errors found in your web pages, it will reflect on your performance as a webmaster. Improper coding will result in a poor performance and you can lose clients due to lots of errors showing up when your web pages go live. Even if you test your web page in all platforms and in all browsers, there are many bugs in the codes that can’t be seen easily.
It is truly a good practice to undergo HTML validation. While it may be true that the average user does not verify the integrity of your source code, but errors that do show up in their screen will make them turn away from your web site and they will eventually go to a competitor’s website. It is very important that you validate your source code as often as you make changes to your site, to prevent careless mistakes especially to those existing pages that previously didn’t contain any errors. You can go through HTML validation each time you create a web page or else you will have to deal with converting too many web pages when you find errors.
You can find websites that offer online HTML validation, or acquire a program that will permit you to do offline HTML validation.
