HTML Links
The HTML <a> tag defines a hyperlink.
The most important attribute of the <a> element is the href attribute, which indicates the link's destination.
The link text is the part that will be visible to the reader.
Clicking on the link text will send the reader to the specified URL address.
By default, links will appear as follows in all browsers:
- An unvisited link is underlined and blue
- A visited link is underlined and purple
- An active link is underlined and red
By default, the linked page will be displayed in the current browser window. To change this, you must specify another target for the link.
The target attribute specifies where to open the linked document.
The target attribute can have one of the following values:
- _self - Default. Opens the document in the same window/tab as it was clicked
- _blank - Opens the document in a new window or tab
- _parent - Opens the document in the parent frame
- _top - Opens the document in the full body of the window
Both examples above are using an absolute URL (a full web address) in the href attribute.
A local link (a link to a page within the same website) is specified with a relative URL (without the "https://www" part)
To use an image as a link, just put the tag inside the tag:
<a href="default.asp">
<img src="smiley.gif" alt="HTML tutorial" style="width:42px;height:42px;">
</a>
Use mailto: inside the href attribute to create a link that opens the user's email program (to let them send a new email):
<a href="mailto:[email protected]">Send email</a>
The title attribute specifies extra information about an element. The information is most often shown as a tooltip text when the mouse moves over the element.
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