HTML <p> Tag
Topic: HTML5 Tags ReferencePrev|Next
Description
The <p> tag defines a paragraph. The <p> element is the most commonly used block-level element. However, it cannot contain block-level elements (including <p> itself).
The following table summarizes the usages context and the version history of this tag.
| Placement: | Block |
|---|---|
| Content: | Inline and text |
| Start/End Tag: | Start tag: required, End tag: optional |
| Version: | HTML 2, 3.2, 4, 4.01, 5 |
Usage Notes
As a logical element, empty paragraphs are ignored by the browsers, so do not use empty
<p>elements to add blank lines in your web pages. To create blank lines use the<br>tag, or use the CSSmarginproperty instead.When you use the
<p>element to begin a paragraph, it automatically creates some space (margin) above and below the content. This space is applied by the browser's built-in style sheets, but you can override it using CSSmarginproperty.
Syntax
The basic syntax of the <p> tag is given with:
The example below shows the <p> tag in action.
Example
Try this code »<p>This is a paragraph.</p>
<p>This is another paragraph.</p>Note: In HTML, the end tag for the <p> element may be omitted. In XHTML, the <p> tag must be properly closed i.e. both start tag and end tag are required.
Tag-Specific Attributes
The following table shows the attributes that are specific to the <p> tag.
| Attribute | Value | Description |
|---|---|---|
align |
left |
Obsolete Specifies the horizontal alignment of the text within a paragraph. Use the CSS text-align property instead. |
Global Attributes
Like all other HTML tags, the <p> tag supports the global attributes in HTML5.
Event Attributes
The <p> tag also supports the event attributes in HTML5.
Browser Compatibility
The <p> tag is supported in all major modern browsers.
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Basic Support—
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Further Reading
See tutorial on: CSS Alignment.
Related tags: <h1> - <h6>, <div>.
