How To Use Header Tags For SEO

Written By Spindle Digital Agency
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Spindle Digital Agency’s easy-peasy lemon-squeezy guide to using header tags in your content for SEO.

What Are Header Tags?

Header tags are coded elements used to define headings on a webpage. When a search engine crawls your website, they keep track of the header tags on all of your pages, and they use these tags to organize the information on each page of your website.

 In your website code, header tags look like this - <h1> - and range from:

  • <h1>: the most important (page header)

  • <h6>: the least important (tiny sub-sub-sub-headings)

They provide structure, much like an outline or table of contents. For SEO purposes, header tags let a search engine know what each page on your website is about. If your content is organized with proper, well-written headers and corresponding tags, search engines can better match your content to a user’s query. 

Basically, proper header tags make your website more likely to show up in search results.

SEO Best Practices for Header Tags

  • One <h1> Tag Per Page

Purpose: This is the main heading—think of it like the title of a book.

SEO Tip: A page’s H1 tag should describe what the entire page is about and include a target keyword when possible.

Example:

<h1>Affordable Keto Meal Plans for Beginners</h1>

  • Use Headers to Break Up Content Logically

Structure your content like an outline, or the table of contents of a book:

<h1> = book title

<h2> = chapter 1 title

<h3> = sub-sections of chapter 1

<h2> = chapter 2 title

<h3> = sub-section of chapter 2

<h4> = sub section of previous sub-section…and so on.

Example:

<h1>The Ultimate Guide to Trail Running</h1>

<h2>Why Trail Running?</h2>

<h2>What Gear You Need</h2>

<h3>Trail Running Shoes</h3>

<h3>Hydration Packs</h3>

<h2>Best Trails by Region</h2>

  • Include Keywords Naturally

    Use relevant keywords in your headers, but don’t force them. Also, you only need to use a keyword as many times as it sounds natural to use it. In other words, don’t keyword-stuff your headers!

  • Keep headers Concise

    Make headers clear and scannable. Visitors should be able to skim through your headings and understand what the page covers.

 

How Many Headers Do You Need Per Page?

There’s no fixed number of H2, H3, and so on, but there should only be a single H1 per page.

  • 1 <h1>

  • Multiple <h2> tags for main sections

  • Optional <h3> and deeper if content is complex


Tips For Header Tags 

  • Don't use header tags for styling alone (like bolding text or increasing the font size). Use header tags only when it defines a section.

  • Don’t assume making the text bigger will insert the proper header tag. Often, it does not.

  • Make headers accessible. Screen readers use headers to navigate, so headers are really important to vision-impaired folks.

  • Don’t skip header levels. In other words, don’t go straight from H1 to H3.

  • Schema + headers. If you're using structured data (like for recipes or FAQs), your headers should reflect the content structure you're marking up.

  • Capitalize every letter in a header, or use title case.

I Made My Header Text Bigger. Does That Mean My Headers Are Tagged Correctly?

Well…no. Even if your headers look like headers, they may not be tagged correctly in the code. You will need to double-check with the classic “right-click, View Source, search for ‘<h1>’…” method, use the WAVE accessibility checker, or another SEO tool. 

We’ve found that tagging headers correctly can be tricky with some of the major website building platforms out there, such as Shopify (depending on the theme). You may need to edit the code directly. 

Need help with your header tags? Holler.

Shoot us an email today!

Spindle Digital Agency