HTML Basics – Introduction

Welcome to the world of HTML! If you’re just starting with web development, the first and most important thing you need to understand is HTML, or HyperText Markup Language. Don’t be intimidated by its length—it's actually much simpler than it seems at first glance.

HTML is nothing more than the framework of a website. It’s like building a house: the bricks and walls are the structures on which everything else is built. On a website, these bricks and walls are formed by HTML elements.

You often hear that 'HTML is just a markup language' — and that's true. This means it isn’t a programming language, so you won’t perform operations or calculations with it. HTML is used to describe and structure content. It tells the browser: 'this is a title,' 'this is a paragraph,' 'this is an image,' 'this is a link.'

What Does an HTML Page Look Like?

Every HTML page is built on a tree structure with a 'root' from which various sections branch out. The basic structure is very simple: there is a head section (<head>) and a body (<body>). The head section contains background information (such as the title, character encoding, or links to external style sheets), while the body contains the content that visitors will see.

Every website on the internet is built on HTML—even those created with modern frameworks and stylish interfaces. If the HTML structure is poor or unclear, the browser won’t be able to display the page properly. Moreover, Google and other search engines read the HTML to understand what your site is about. So, if you start by learning to build well-structured HTML, you’ll save yourself a lot of time and trouble later on.

The Evolution of HTML

HTML has continuously evolved. Today, we use the HTML5 standard, which has introduced many new, modern elements. For example, there are distinct elements for navigation (<nav>), footer (<footer>), main content (<main>), or articles (<article>). These not only help make your code more organized but also make it much clearer for search engines and assistive technologies (such as screen readers) to understand the structure of your content.

HTML and Style

It’s important to understand that HTML is the structure, while CSS is the style. This means that while HTML describes what is on the page (for example, titles, text, lists), CSS determines how it looks. For now, it’s enough to feel confident with HTML. The styles come later and will be much easier to manage once you’re comfortable writing HTML by hand.

In Summary

HTML is a friendly, logical, and easy-to-learn language. You may encounter many new tags and rules now, but in a few days, it will start to feel like a second language. Once you understand its fundamentals, every subsequent web technology you learn (be it CSS, JavaScript, or any framework) will be much easier to grasp.

And remember: every great website – whether it’s Google, Facebook, or ReadyTools – began with someone writing:

... <h1>Hello, world!</h1>

This is the opening statement of the web. Everything starts here. 🙂