Use of the <small> tag

[dziner]

I've never used the small tag before. But I started a new job towards the end of a complete site re-design project and found that this tag is used in a few areas.

<small>small text</small>

Sometimes this isn't an issue but I've noticed that different browsers interpret the <small> tag differently. Sometimes it's legible, sometimes it's too small to read.

The W3C says that the <small> tag renders the text in a small font. That leaves a lot of room for error.

Small tag on W3C

I'm thinking that using the <small> tag isn't such a great idea and that I should probably style these instances with CSS instead. Does anyone have any input on the use of the <small> tag?

[J Windebank]

I'm thinking that using the <small> tag isn't such a great idea and that I should probably style these instances with CSS instead. Does anyone have any input on the use of the <small> tag?

I can't see any use for it personally, and believe it should probably be deprecated. The <small> tag does not tell me anything about the text, it is purely a formatting tag. I wouldn't use it.

Regards,
Jordan

[gnarly]

1) It's not a tag, it's an element.

2) You can control the way it renders text using CSS, same as any other element. It doesn't take much effort to make it render the same across most browsers.

3) Jordan's right, it carries virtually no semantic meaning, so I'd avoid it unless you really need it.

[AutisticCuckoo]

Someone (Jukka Korpela?) suggested that we could use the SMALL element as the opposite of EM; i.e., to de-emphasise something. If not, it's purely presentational and should be replaced with CSS.

1) It's not a tag, it's an element.

Actually, <small>, as written in the thread title, is a tag. <small>some text</small> is an element.

[Blue Sky]

use EMs instead.

[junjun]

Someone (Jukka Korpela?) suggested that we could use the SMALL element as the opposite of EM; i.e., to de-emphasise something.

Actually, that sounds like a really good idea. It would be useful when you go off topic with a paragraph for instance. Jukka did mention it when talking about Phrase Elements