HTML (HyperText Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheet) are the fundamental web development languages. HTML defines a website’s content and structure, while CSS specifies the design and presentation. Together, both languages allow to create a website that is well-structured and functional. CSS defines style declarations and applies them to HTML documents. There are three different ways to link CSS to HTML based on three different types of CSS styles:
This article will focus on external CSS to an HTML file linking as it changes the appearance of your entire website with just one file. We’ll also include a more detailed explanation of CSS and its benefits. Download Complete CSS cheat sheet How to Link CSS to HTML File – Video TutorialLooking for visual guide? Check out this video.
Subscribe For more educational videos! Hostinger Academy While there are multiple approaches linking CSS to an HTML file, the most efficient way is to link an external style sheet to an HTML document. It requires a separate document with a .css extension which solely contains all CSS rules without HTML tags. Unlike internal and inline styles, this method changes many HTML pages by editing one CSS file. It saves time – there is no need to change each CSS property on every website’s HTML page. Start linking style sheets to HTML files by creating an external CSS document using an HTML text editor and adding CSS rules. For instance, here are the style rules of example.css: Make sure not to add a space between the property value. For example, instead of margin-right: 30px write margin-right: 30 px. Then, use the <link> tag in the <head> section of your HTML page to link a CSS file to an HTML document. Next, specify the name of your external CSS file. In this case, it’s example.css so the code will look as follows: <head> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="example.css" media=”screen” /> </head>For better understanding, here’s a breakdown of the attributes contained within the <link> tag:
Once you’ve included the <link> element in your HTML file, save the changes and enter your website’s URL in your web browser. Styles written in the CSS file should change the look of the website. Although external CSS helps make the web development process easier, there are a few things to keep in mind that HTML pages might not be rendered properly before the external style sheet is loaded. Furthermore, linking to several CSS documents can increase your website’s loading time. On that note, if you want to edit a specific HTML element, it might be better to use the inline style method. Meanwhile, the internal or embedded style might be ideal for applying CSS rules to a single page. Reasons to Use CSSCSS is a style sheet language that manages the website’s visual representation. It consists of a list of formatting rules to style elements written in markup languages like HTML. In addition, CSS defines the display of HTML elements on various media types, such as projected presentations or television-type devices. Whenever a browser finds a style sheet, it’ll convert the HTML file according to the provided style information. Hence, it’s important to link CSS to an HTML file to give your site a more engaging look across devices. Other benefits from linking a CSS file to an HTML document are:
On the other hand, CSS has several disadvantages, such as:
All in all, CSS plays an important role when designing a website. It controls the formatting of various elements on a web page, such as fonts, background colors, and object positions. With the right application of CSS and HTML, a website can give an optimized user experience. ConclusionEmbedding CSS rules to HTML elements can be time-consuming and energy-wasting. Luckily, external style sheets make the process more efficient. CSS external style sheets are documents containing a list of style rules. Link them to an HTML document, and you’ll be able to change multiple pages at once, avoiding code bloat and keeping your HTML structure clean. We hope that knowing how to link CSS to HTML easily will save you time when creating a website to focus more on growing the traffic. If you’re interested to learn more about coding, head to our guide on learning to code.
In order to link HTML to CSS in your HTML file, you need to use link tags with the right attributes. Remember that, as a self-closing tag, the link tag should be included in the head section of your HTML file.
Check that your files are in the same folder if you have trouble linking your CSS to HTML. Check that the file path is correct if the CSS file is in a different folder. |