Commenting is a good practice when coding using HTML. So, how to add comments in HTML? Adding comments to your code is important when documenting software. Comments are not visible on the web page because they are not aimed at the reader. Browsers ignore any text inside the comment tag, so it’s not visible on the web. There is HTML for comments to explain a code. The aim of writing code comments is to make the code readable and to explain the code in terms of what the various parts are doing. Users often use comments to monitor lines of code. HTML comments come in handy when a community of developers works on a single project. Their main role is to facilitate communication.
Types of HTML Comments
There are four types of HTML comments
1. Single Line Comments
Users can comment on a single line. Note that single-line comments begin with the special arrow
<!--- comment--->.
The compiler then ignores the content between the forward slash and the end of the line.
An example of a single-line comment is when used before a line of code like the following:
<! --- Code Comments---> <Users can comment on single lines>.
Here is an example of a comment used at the end of a line of code:
< Users can comment on single lines;! --- Code Comment--->.
2. Multi-Line Comments
Users can use HTML comment code on multiple lines. Nevertheless, the comment does not appear. Only lines of code will be output.
HTML comment tag
You can use <comment> to add a comment to a code. However, note that this is usually only possible with Internet Explorer.
3. Conditional Comments
These comments are used to execute specific codes with specific conditions. Internet Explorer supports conditional comments like the <comment> tag.
Uses of Comments
While there are no specific guidelines for using comments, different developers have their preferences. Basically, comments are used:
- Explain the reason for writing the code.
- To highlight the result of a code.
- To bring clarity to code lines.
Users should note that the use of comments is not limited to the above three situations. There have many ways they can be used.
Generally, programmers use comments during debugging. They use comments to request that a browser ignore a code without necessarily eliminating it, as they diagnose the cause of a problem and try to fix the problem.
Use HTML comments only if they create value for a program. Developers don’t need to explain every single function of code in the program. They should also be aware of best practices for adding comments to HTML, such as not adding comments to obvious things. Note that overuse of comments can cause confusion in the primary code.
Users should not restore existing codes. Note that comments are used to explain the logic in code. Don’t use them to say what’s already written in a line of code. Developers should avoid long comments if possible. In cases where they feel that long comments will be needed to explain complex functionality, they may choose documentation entries instead.
Although comments are not rendered on a website, anyone on the Internet can access them if you make the document public. They can help you track and monitor code even after months of not working on it. They support communication with other developers.
Comments have two main benefits, making your code easier to understand and keeping track of different parts of the code.
Reasons to avoid HTML comments if you can
Developers use HTML comments to increase the readability of their code, for debugging, to help other people decipher their code, and to identify closing tags. Apart from the reasons above, here’s why you should avoid HTML comments.
Developers use HTML comments to increase the readability of their code, for debugging, to help other people decipher their code, and to identify closing tags. Apart from the reasons above, here’s why you should avoid HTML comments.
This may affect the user experience
You may wonder how HTML comments can affect performance, yet comments are not rendered on the website.
Note that comments are still part of the Document Object Model (DOM). It increases the DOM element, thus affecting the responsiveness of a web page. This can also affect speed, which manifests itself in slower manipulation of DOM and CSS selectors.
This can hurt your SEO
Too many HTML comments can affect your SEO, but not keyword or content rankings. Comments are ignored by the browser and are not factored into the ranking. However, they might affect your page loading speed.
Too many comments will increase the size of documents and web pages by bytes. This will affect page load times, negatively impacting your rankings. Note that users will exit a page after clicking if it takes more than 3 seconds to load, resulting in a high bounce rate. A high bounce rate is a negative sign for websites as it sends the message that the page is not helpful to visitors.
Too many comments also hurt the text-to-HTML ratio. A good text-to-HTML ratio should be maintained between 25 and 70 percent. The aspect ratio represents the percentage of visible content. Note that search engines tend to give higher rankings to websites with lots of visual content
Bandwidth loss
Large HTML5 comment content leads to increased bandwidth usage. More bytes can increase traffic significantly.
Conclusion
HTML comments, when used in the right way and in the right amount, are useful for developers. Using them, you can make your code more comprehensible. Anyone can open your source code.
If you’re working on a project with a team of other developers, comments can help keep you on the same page and facilitate collaboration. The information above provides you with the guiding basics on how to add comments to HTML, what they are, how to use them, when to use them, why developers use them, and when to avoid them.
Learn more about best HTML commenting practices to make your coding project smoother. If you want to know how to learn HTML then you can read this article.
