{"id":1503,"date":"2025-12-30T10:21:33","date_gmt":"2025-12-30T10:21:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/?p=1503"},"modified":"2026-05-24T11:28:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T11:28:10","slug":"what-deprecated-really-means-in-html","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/what-deprecated-really-means-in-html\/","title":{"rendered":"What \u201cdeprecated\u201d really means in HTML"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Below are <strong>practical, standards-aligned lists<\/strong> based primarily on <strong>HTML5 \/ HTML Living Standard<\/strong> usage as implemented by modern browsers. I am separating them the way developers usually need them separated in real work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Obsolete HTML tags<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Obsolete<\/strong> means: removed from the HTML specification and should not be used. Browsers may still render them for legacy reasons, but they are considered dead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Fully obsolete (HTML5)<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<pre class=\"wp-block-code\"><code>&lt;acronym&gt;\n&lt;applet&gt;\n&lt;basefont&gt;\n&lt;big&gt;\n&lt;center&gt;\n&lt;dir&gt;\n&lt;font&gt;\n&lt;frame&gt;\n&lt;frameset&gt;\n&lt;noframes&gt;\n&lt;isindex&gt;\n&lt;strike&gt;\n&lt;tt&gt;\n<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Notes<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><code>&lt;frame&gt;<\/code> \/ <code>&lt;frameset&gt;<\/code> are completely obsolete; use CSS layout or <code>&lt;iframe&gt;<\/code> instead.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><code>&lt;font&gt;<\/code>, <code>&lt;center&gt;<\/code>, <code>&lt;big&gt;<\/code>, <code>&lt;strike&gt;<\/code>, <code>&lt;tt&gt;<\/code> were replaced by CSS and semantic elements.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><code>&lt;applet&gt;<\/code> was replaced by <code>&lt;object&gt;<\/code> (itself rarely appropriate today).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Deprecated HTML tags<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Deprecated<\/strong> means: still recognized, still works, but discouraged and may be removed or restricted in the future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">HTML itself has <strong>very few truly \u201cdeprecated\u201d elements<\/strong>; most were moved directly to <em>obsolete<\/em>. However, the following elements are <strong>formally allowed but discouraged<\/strong> or <strong>contextually deprecated<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Deprecated or discouraged elements (HTML5 \/ WHATWG)<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<pre class=\"wp-block-code\"><code>&lt;menu&gt;        (traditional usage; redefined but discouraged for lists)\n&lt;menuitem&gt;    (removed from most browsers; deprecated before removal)\n<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Historically deprecated (but now obsolete)<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">These are often still referred to as \u201cdeprecated\u201d in older documentation, but are now formally <strong>obsolete<\/strong>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<pre class=\"wp-block-code\"><code>&lt;center&gt;\n&lt;font&gt;\n&lt;strike&gt;\n&lt;tt&gt;\n&lt;big&gt;\n<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Important clarification (this trips people up)<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">HTML5 <strong>shifted emphasis away from \u201cdeprecated tags\u201d<\/strong> and instead:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Removed elements entirely<\/strong> (obsolete)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Deprecated attributes<\/strong>, not tags<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So in modern HTML, you will see <em>many more deprecated attributes than elements<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Common deprecated HTML attributes (for completeness)<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">These are still widely encountered in legacy code:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<pre class=\"wp-block-code\"><code>align\nbgcolor\nborder\ncellpadding\ncellspacing\ncolor\ncompact\nheight (on some elements)\nwidth (on some elements)\nnowrap\nvalign\n<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">All are replaced by <strong>CSS<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Practical guidance for your projects<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Treat <strong>obsolete tags as forbidden<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Treat <strong>deprecated constructs as technical debt<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Prefer <strong>semantic HTML + CSS<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Assume browsers will keep rendering obsolete tags, but <strong>validators and tools will not<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Below are practical, standards-aligned lists based primarily on HTML5 \/ HTML Living Standard usage as implemented by modern browsers. I am separating them the way developers usually need them separated in real work. Obsolete HTML tags Obsolete means: removed from the HTML specification and should not be used. Browsers may still render them for legacy &#8230; <a title=\"What \u201cdeprecated\u201d really means in HTML\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/what-deprecated-really-means-in-html\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about What \u201cdeprecated\u201d really means in HTML\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":1504,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1503"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1503\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woodcentral.com\/-\/peter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}