What does 'Good Text-to-HTML Ratio' mean in Site Audit?
Good Text-to-HTML Ratio
Description
Your page has a good text-to-HTML ratio of 25% or higher.
How to Fix
No action needed. Your text-to-HTML ratio is good.
Detailed Analysis
A good text-to-HTML ratio is a crucial aspect of on-page SEO that influences how search engines perceive the quality and relevance of a webpage. Let's delve into the specifics of this issue:
1. What Causes This Issue
A good text-to-HTML ratio indicates a healthy balance between the amount of actual text content and the HTML code used to create the page structure. This metric is calculated by dividing the amount of text on a page by the total amount of HTML code.
Causes of Low Text-to-HTML Ratio:
- Excessive HTML Code: Overuse of inline CSS, JavaScript, or unnecessary HTML tags.
 - Minimal Content: Pages with little actual text content, such as image-heavy pages with limited descriptive text.
 - Embedded Elements: Heavy reliance on embedded multimedia elements without accompanying descriptive text.
 - Complex Code Structures: Use of frameworks or themes that generate excess code.
 
2. Why It's Important
- Search Engine Crawling: A higher text-to-HTML ratio can make it easier for search engine bots to crawl and understand the main content of your page, as there's less "noise" from excessive code.
 - User Experience: A good balance ensures that users find meaningful content without unnecessary delays caused by loading excessive code.
 - Relevance and Ranking: Pages with a higher ratio of text are often seen as more relevant or informative, potentially improving search rankings.
 - Page Load Speed: Less HTML code can lead to faster page loading times, which is crucial for both user experience and SEO.
 
3. Best Practices to Prevent Issues with Text-to-HTML Ratio
- Optimize HTML: Minimize the use of unnecessary HTML tags, and remove redundant code.
 - Externalize CSS and JavaScript: Use external files for CSS and JavaScript instead of inline styles and scripts.
 - Focus on Quality Content: Ensure that your page contains substantial and relevant text content that provides value to the users.
 - Use Efficient Code: Adopt clean and efficient coding practices, and consider using frameworks or CMS themes that prioritize minimal code.
 - Compress and Minify: Use tools to minify HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to reduce file sizes and improve load times.
 - Use of Semantic HTML: Utilize semantic HTML tags (like 
<article>,<section>,<header>, etc.) to improve the structure and accessibility of content. 
4. Examples of Good and Bad Cases
Good Case:
- A blog page with 1000 words of well-structured content, using minimal and clean HTML code, external stylesheets, and JavaScript.
 - A product page with detailed descriptions, reviews, and specifications, with images optimized and text content as the primary focus.
 
Bad Case:
- A landing page predominantly made up of large images and videos with little to no accompanying text content.
 - A webpage with a large amount of inline styles and scripts, making the HTML code bloated, with minimal actual text content.
 
By maintaining a good text-to-HTML ratio, you ensure that your pages are not only search engine friendly but also provide a fast, accessible, and engaging experience for users. This balance is essential for achieving optimal SEO performance.
Updated 3 months ago
