Alt text serves two audiences at once: people using screen readers who can't see the image, and search engine crawlers that can't 'see' an image the way a human can. Google uses alt text as one of several signals to understand what an image depicts and to rank it in Google Images, and it also contributes minor context to the surrounding page's topic. Good alt text is specific and concise — describing what's actually in the image and, where relevant, its purpose on the page — rather than a keyword-stuffed phrase. Decorative images (a background pattern, a divider) should generally use an empty alt attribute (alt="") so screen readers skip over them instead of reading meaningless filler.
Example
An ecommerce product photo uses alt text like 'Men's navy wool overcoat, front view' instead of just 'coat' or a keyword-stuffed 'buy cheap mens coat online.'
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Related terms
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