Web Designer Freelance Interview Question:

Tell me when do you use the following HTML5 tags:
STRONG, EM, SMALL?

Submitted by: Muhammad

Although these tags create specific visual treatment (STRONG makes the text bold, EM makes it italicised and SMALL makes it smaller), this is not their purpose and they should not be used simply to style a piece of content in a specific way.

Each of the three has semantic purpose and should only be used to mark text as follows:

☛ EM - Emphasized text. This is text that should be emphasized thus changing the meaning of its context.

☛ STRONG - Strong importance. Can be used in titles, headings or paragraphs to emphasize the word or phrase that bears the most importance in the sentence. It can also be used to stress the importance, or seriousness, of a word or phrase.

☛ SMALL - Small print. Used for disclaimers, clarifications and general de-emphasizing of the marked text.

☛ To style text as bold, italic or in smaller font, generic tags can be used and the styles applied with CSS code instead of abusing semantic HTML5 elements.
Submitted by: Muhammad