HTML5 Pocket Reference, 5th Edition

Name

a

Synopsis

<a> . . . </a>

Defines an anchor that can be used as a hypertext link or a named fragment within the document. When the href attribute is set to a valid URI, the anchor is a hypertext link to a web page, page fragment, or another resource. The id attribute labels an anchor and allows it to serve as the destination point of a link. An a element may have both href and id attributes. The href attribute may be omitted to use an a element as a “placeholder link.”

HTML5 permits flow content (block elements) within a elements. There must be no interactive content (a, audio with controls, button, details, embed, iframe, img with usemap, input, keygen, label, object with usemap, select, textarea, and video with controls) contained in an a element.

Usage

Categories:

Flow content, phrasing content, interactive content, palpable content

Permitted contexts:

Where phrasing content is expected

Permitted content:

Transparent, but may not contain other interactive elements

Start/end tags:

Required/Required

Attributes

HTML5 Global Attributes

download="file name"

WHATWG and HTML5.1 only. Indicates the link is used for downloading a resource. The value is the name the resource file should be given on the local file system once it is downloaded.

href="URI"

Specifies the location of the destination document or web resource (such as an image, audio, PDF, or other media file).

hreflang="language code"

Specifies the base language of the target document.

media="all|aural|braille|handheld|print|projection|screen|tty|tv" ...