Image Title vs Alt Text: Which is More Important for SEO?

Search engine optimization has a lot of different elements you should be paying attention to while creating content. Images are a great medium to use while creating content, but there are some things you should be doing in order to optimize them for SEO. For example, you should be using image alt text and image title.

They both serve a somewhat similar purpose, but there are some differences that you will need to understand. In this article, you will learn the difference between image alt text versus image title.

Image Alt Text vs. Image Title - What's the Difference?

To know the difference, here’s a little bit about image alt text and image title.

Image Alt Text

Alt text, which is short for alternative text, is an HTML attribute. With images, it acts as a way for the website owner to describe the image in the case that the image can’t be loaded, the internet connection is super sluggish, images somehow were disabled in the browser, or if the visitor is using a screen reader due to a visual disability. When applied to an image, the alt text provides context and information when it can’t be viewed.

Code-wise, the alt text for an image uses alt=”IMAGE DESCRIPTION HERE”. Note: Text doesn’t need to be capitalized. This is just to let you know that the image’s description goes between the quotation marks.

When added to the HTML markup of an image, the image alt text looks like:

<img src=”your-image-here.jpg” alt=”IMAGE DESCRIPTION HERE” />

When using alt text, you should use a brief description phrase that tells the user what the image is about. The image itself should somehow relate to your text, or keywords in order to let search engines understand how your article and image correlates with each other.

For example, if you have an image like the one above, with the sunny day shining through some pink balloons, then your alt text might be something like “hot pink balloons on a sunny day”. The description seems simple, but it should convey enough about the image that visually impaired website visitors should understand what they can’t see, but still exists. Additionally, search engines will pick this image up and index it with other images of hot pink balloons, or even sunny days.

The reason why alt text for images is really important SEO-wise, is because it helps search engines understand the content of your website, other than the regular text or other types of content. It gives a bigger and overall view of your site. When you give an accurate and descriptive alt text for your images, you tell search engines that your website is relevant to specific keywords and phrases.

Image Title

Now that you know about image alt text, it’s time to talk about image titles. These used to allow anyone to hover their mouse over an image and see the name or description of the image. They are only visible when you actually hover the mouse over them, so any other time the image title isn’t showing. That would seem weird if they were viewable all the time, right?

Another area that image titles aren’t seen, are within the search results. The purpose of image titles are to give more information about the image or even go further as to give the source of the image. You can even use the image title to credit the photographer, or provide a caption.

Image title looks like title=”IMAGE INFORMATION HERE” and within the image HTML element looks like:

<img src=”your-image-here.jpg” title=”IMAGE INFORMATION HERE” />

The title doesn’t need to be capitalized like in the example.

An example of an image title would be if you had a picture like the one above, of the Statue of Liberty. You can label your image title as “Statue of Liberty, New York City, USA”. As a result of using this label, you’re telling visitors what is in the image and where the image was taken.

Why Both Are Important for SEO

Regardless of whether you’re writing as a lifestyle blogger or creating content for your small business, it's extremely important to use both alt text and image titles for your images. In using both, you will improve the SEO of your website, as both alt text and image titles give valuable information about your images, which search engines need in order to understand the content of your website.

Make sure to provide accurate and descriptive alt text for your images to help your website rank higher in search results for those keywords and phrases. However, when using hand-in-hand with image titles, you’re being conscientious about your website’s accessibility.

Not everyone uses the internet the same way you do and it’s important to make an effort to make it easy for as many people to access your site as they can. When you provide additional information about your images, you are ensuring that your website is more user-friendly and accessible to a wider audience.

If you didn’t know, using alt text and image titles also complies with best web standards and practices. Web accessibility guidelines require that all images have alt text, and using image titles is considered a best practice for usability and accessibility.

In Summary

So, to conclude, both alt text and image titles are important for overall SEO and accessibility. When using alt text, you provide necessary information about an image for impaired users, while also allowing the search search engines to get a better understanding of what’s on your website. As for image titles, they can also give you further information and context, as well as make your site more accessible to others.

Make sure to use both when you’re adding images to all of your content, whether it’s a regular blog post or page. While they are both good for SEO, your visitors will be really happy that you’ve taken the extra time to implement both for your images.

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