Metadata is information about the page/site data.
The <meta> tag provides metadata about the HTML document. Metadata will not be displayed on the page, but will be parse-able by your browser and search engines.
Meta elements are typically used to specify page description, keywords, author of the document, last modified, and other metadata as generated by our meta tag generator. Some browsers, such as Microsoft Internet Explorer, support Meta Transitions. A meta transition is an effect you can use for fancy page transitions.
Meta Tag Placement
Meta tags must always be placed in the head of your HTML document, that is somewhere between the head tags:
- <head>
- META TAGS GO HERE!
- </head>
There are two possible attributes for meta tags:
<META HTTP-EQUIV=”name” CONTENT=”content”><META NAME=”name” CONTENT=”content”>
The most important meta tags and the ones you need most on your site may be generated by using our easy-to-use meta tag generator on our homepage.
The following list of links will take you to information about each of the individual Meta tags that we offer information on:
Recommended Tags
+Meta Content Language (non-US English ONLY)
This is useful for non-English language sites to help the search engines properly index them. The tag looks like this:
<meta http-equiv="Content-Language" content="PL" /> +Meta Content Type
This is essential to make your page display properly - usually your generator or web editor automatically inserts this tag:
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-2022-JP" />
+Meta Description
This is a short description of your site - no more than 255 characters:
<meta name="description" content="The best site on meta tags on the web." />+Meta Keywords
Keywords which describe your site's content - no more than 12 (or you're spamming!) - separated by a comma and a space:
<meta name="keywords" content="metattags, generator, html, coding" />Facebook Open Graph Meta Tags
Facebook now uses its own meta tags so that you can control how the links to your pages look when somebody “likes” it on Facebook. Be sure to use these to help your Facebook marketing and to help you build ‘buzz’. Find out how and even generate them by using our generator designed just for Open Graph Meta Tags.
Optional Meta Tags
+Meta Abstract
A short summary of the description. The Meta Abstract was used primarily with academic papers. The content for this tag is usually 10 words or less. None of the major search engines really support this tag.
<metaname="Abstract" content="Short description of page" />+Meta Author
This is a recognized standard tag, yet does not help with search engines - primarily, it will help the developer of your site get additional work - or spam!:
<meta name="Author" content="John Smith, jsmith@xyzcorporation.com" />
+Meta Copyright
A copyright notice may appear here (what lawyers call "constructive notice"). THIS IS NOT COPYRIGHT PROTECTION! Consult a copyright attorney for copyright information and procedures:
<meta name="copyright" content="Copyright © 2010 Xyz Corp." />+Meta Designer
Search engines do not parse nor support this tag, but designers like it to perhaps bring them a visit or customer and generate a bit of advertising. This may also be used to catch code thieves.
<meta name="designer" content="Joe Schmoe, jschmoe@abc.com" />+Meta Distribution
The Meta Distribution tag is used to declare the distribution of your web content which may be:
This tag IS NOT recommended. If you want to restrict distribution, use the robots.txt tag or your HTAccess file.
- Global (the entire web)
- Local (reserved for the local IP block of your site)
- IU (Internal Use, not for public distribution)
<meta name="distribution" content="global" />This tag IS NOT recommended. If you want to restrict distribution, use the robots.txt tag or your HTAccess file.
+Meta Google
The Meta Google tag is used only by Google and it has four options:
- Googlebot: noarchive - does not allow Google to display cached content
- Googlebot: nosnippet - does not allow Google to display excerpted or cached content
- Googlebot: noindex - similar to the robots meta element
- Googlebot: nofollow - do not allow Google to pass any PageRank or link popularity to the link served.
<meta name="googlebot" content="noindex, nofollow, noarchive, nosnippet" />+Meta MSN (No ODP)
The Meta MSN (No ODP) tag is used for your description in the MSN search results instead of the description used in DMOZ. This is used by the MSN bot.
<meta Name="msnbot" content="NOODP" />
+Meta Title
Do not use the Meta Title tag. Instead use the title tag!
The Meta Title Tag would look like this:
<title>Your Page Title Goes Here</title>The Meta Title Tag would look like this:
<meta Name="title" content="Your page title" />
+Meta Transitions
Meta Transitions use meta tags to create fancy page transitions, such as fade-out, box-out and more. These are not supported by all browsers, so do not rely upon them to always work for all users.
>>>More Meta Transition Tags...
<meta http-equiv="Page-Enter" content="blendTrans(Duration=2.0)" />>>>More Meta Transition Tags...
Not Recommended Meta Tags
+Meta Content Script Type
This tag is useless as modern search engines can parse script without it:
<meta http-equiv="Content-Script-Type" content="text/javascript" /> +Meta Content Style Type
Not recommended. Web browsers do not look for meta tags to find the stylesheet:
<meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" />
+Meta Distribution
This tag is not recommended. If you want to restrict distribution, use HTACCESS or a robots.txt file or both:
<meta name="distribution" content="global">+Meta Email
A spammer's favorite tag. Email address harvesters working in conjunction with spambots will harvest your email address and then you will be inundated with spam. This may be useful if you wish to be contacted this way and have a spam-catcher email address.
<meta name="email" content="your.email@address.com" /> +Meta Expires
Now why would someone want to tell a search engine that their page was expired? Not only that, but search engines and browsers ignore this tag.
<meta http-equiv="expires" content="Fri, 31 Dec 2010 09:00:00 GMT" />+Meta Generator
This tag is used by your web design software for marketing and statistical purposes. Search engines ignore it, so you do not need it. This tag serves no purpose for your page. Chances are your site creation software inserted one of these by default, if so, it's okay, just leave it - especially for Open Source generators such as WordPress or Joomla - it's free, so do them the favor!
<meta name="generator" content="WordPress 2.9.2" /> <!- - leave this for stats - ->
+Meta MS Smart Tags
These evil tags were part of a beta test of Internet Explorer. They were quickly removed after much negative press and rage from users. In short, Microsoft would sell keyword phrases, then the Meta MS Smart Tags would allow for those keywords to be highlighted on web pages that would take the user to the advertiser's site - sort of like Microsoft sneaking Konterra ads on your page. This would mean your site could advertise your competitor's site without your consent.
<META NAME="MSSmartTagsPreventParsing" CONTENT="TRUE" /> +Meta Persistence
Meta persistence tag will tell the browser to remember your last page settings for dynamic content... for example, checked boxes or like with this page, opened or expanded items will be open when the user returns to the same page, to find the exact same mess he left behind!
<meta name="save" content="history" />+Meta Pragma No-Cache
The Meta Pragma No Cache tag is used to prevent visitors from seeing a cached version of a specific page - it forces the server to send the data with each visit - this can be very taxing for a server on a high traffic site, so use it carefully. The Meta Pragma No Cache tag forces the browser to pull information from the server each time the page is viewed.
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Pragma" CONTENT="no-cache" /> +Meta Publisher
The Meta Publisher tag does exactly the same thing as the Meta Generator tag: It's used to declare the name and version number of the publishing tool used to create the page. It serves your page no purpose, but is perhaps useful to the software vendor.
<META NAME="Publisher" CONTENT="FrontPage 4.0" /> +Meta Rating
This tag is useless as it is not recognized by the W3C. This tag is used to display a content rating similar to the movie rating system (i.e. PG-13) - we have included it in our generator as some publishers of adult material choose to err on the side of safety and voluntarily use some type of rating system in the absence of any official one. This tag is widely used for such reasons.
<meta name="Rating" content="General" /> +Meta Refresh
This tag is bad because search engines regard it as spam and will penalize your page if you use it. The refresh tag will specify a delay before the browser automatically reloads the page or loads another URL. If you must do this, use a 301 or 302 redirect.
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Refresh" CONTENT="3;URL=http://www.domain.com/page.html" /> +Meta Reply-To
Like the email tag, a spammers' tag. Email address harvesters working in conjunction with spambots will harvest your email address and then you will be inundated with spam.
<meta name="reply-to" content="your.email@address.com" /> +Meta Resource Type
The Meta Resource Type tag is used to declare the resource of a page. Do not use this tag, but rather use the DTD Declaration instead.
<META name="resource-type" content="document" />+Meta Revisit After
In theory the Meta Revisit tag tells a search engine when to come back for a fresh and updated version of your page. This is widely believed but untrue - search engines come back whenever they feel like it and on their own schedule, so this tag is basically useless.
<META NAME="Revisit-After" CONTENT="30 days Days" />+Meta Robots
The Meta Robots tag supposedly directs search engine bots on a per-page basis telling them what to index or not. Search engines ignore this tag as it is outdated and you should instead use a robots.txt file or modify your .htaccess file to control access to pages.
<META NAME="ROBOTS" CONTENT="NOINDEX, FOLLOW" />+Meta Set Cookie
The Meta Set Cookie tag is a cookie used to set a cookie in the user's web browser. This tag is considered outdated as there are better ways to use cookies. If you set an expiration date, the cookie is considered permanent and will be saved to disk (until it expires), otherwise it will be considered valid only for the current session and will be erased when your visitor closes his browser.
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Set-Cookie" CONTENT="cookievalue=xxx;expires=Wednesday, 21-Oct-98 16:14:21 GMT; path=/" />+Meta Subject
This tag is obsolete. The Meta Subject tag was used to declare the subject of the web site. Modern search engines ignore this tag and actually parse the page to capture the subject.
<META NAME="Subject" CONTENT="Your Web Page Subject" />+Meta VW96.ObjectType
The Meta VW96.ObjectType is used to define the purpose of specific pages. This is from the Dublin Core report and uses a defined schema of document types such as FAQ, HOW TO, etc. Search engines ignore this tag, so it is useless. This is from the 1990's - yet another idea that never took off.
