What is HTML formatting / beautifying?

HTML beautifying adds consistent indentation and line breaks to minified or unformatted HTML so the structure is easy to read. It is the opposite of minification.

What are void elements?

Void elements are HTML tags that have no content or closing tag: , , , , , , and a few others. In HTML5, and are both valid. The "Self-close void elements" option adds a slash before the >, which is required for valid XHTML.

Does my HTML leave my browser?

No. All formatting runs entirely in your browser. Nothing is sent to any server.

Can I format partial HTML (snippets)?

Yes. You can paste a full document or just a snippet of HTML - the formatter handles both.

HTML Formatter & Beautifier

What is HTML beautification?

HTML from templating engines, build tools, or copy-pasted sources is often minified or inconsistently indented. Beautifying adds proper indentation and line breaks so the document hierarchy (head, body, sections, and nested elements) is immediately readable.

HTML5 vs XHTML void elements

In HTML5, void elements like <br>, <img>, and <input> do not need a closing slash. Both <br> and <br/> are valid. However, if you are writing XHTML: or embedding HTML in SVG or XML contexts, the self-closing slash is required. Use the Self-close void elements option to add it automatically.

Indentation styles

Two-space indentation is common in the JavaScript / Node.js ecosystem and keeps deeply nested HTML compact. Four-space indentation is traditional in many enterprise and back-end environments. Tab indentation lets each developer configure the display width in their own editor.

Self-closing tags in HTML5 vs. XHTML

HTML5 allows (but does not require) a trailing slash for void elements like <br>, <img>, and <input>. Both <br> and <br/> are valid and produce identical output in all modern browsers. The self-closing slash is only required in XHTML documents, SVG, or when embedding HTML inside XML. Use the Self-close void elements option only when your deployment context genuinely requires it.

Formatter vs. linter

A formatter (like this tool) fixes only presentation concerns: indentation, line breaks, and whitespace. It does not analyze the correctness of your HTML. A linter - such as HTMLHint or html-validate - detects semantic and accessibility issues: missing alt attributes, invalid nesting, deprecated elements, and ARIA misuse. For production HTML, run both: format for readability, lint for correctness.