The <span> HTML element is a generic inline container for phrasing content, which does not inherently represent anything. It can be used to group elements for styling purposes (using the class or id attributes), or because they share attribute values, such as lang. It should be used only when no other semantic element is appropriate. <span> is very much like a <div> element, but <div> is a block-level element whereas a <span> is an inline-level element.
<span>: The Content Span element
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Attributes
This element only includes the global attributes.
Example
Example 1
HTML
html
<p><span>Some text</span></p>
Result
Example 2
HTML
html
<li>
<span>
<a href="portfolio.html" target="_blank">See my portfolio</a>
</span>
</li>
CSS
css
li span {
background: gold;
}
Result
Technical summary
| Content categories | Flow content, phrasing content. |
|---|---|
| Permitted content | Phrasing content. |
| Tag omission | None, both the starting and ending tag are mandatory. |
| Permitted parents | Any element that accepts phrasing content, or any element that accepts flow content. |
| Implicit ARIA role | No corresponding role |
| Permitted ARIA roles | Any |
| DOM interface | HTMLSpanElement |
Specifications
| Specification |
|---|
| HTML Standard # the-span-element |
Browser compatibility
| Desktop | Mobile | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chrome | Edge | Firefox | Internet Explorer | Opera | Safari | WebView Android | Chrome Android | Firefox for Android | Opera Android | Safari on IOS | Samsung Internet | |
span |
1 | 12 | 1 | Yes | 15 | 1 | 4.4 | 18 | 4 | 14 | 1 | 1.0 |
See also
- HTML
<div>element
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https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/span