Skip to content
    Moz logo Menu open Menu close
    • Products
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Pro Home
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Home
      • STAT
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Home
      • Compare SEO Products
      • Moz Data
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis
      • Keyword Explorer
      • Link Explorer
      • Competitive Research
      • MozBar
      • More Free SEO Tools
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO
      • SEO Learning Center
      • Moz Academy
      • MozCon
      • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers
      • Agency Solutions
      • Enterprise Solutions
      • Small Business Solutions
      • The Moz Story
      • New Releases
    • Log in
    • Log out
    • Products
      • Moz Pro

        Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

      • Moz Local

        Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

      • STAT

        SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

      • Moz API

        Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

      • Compare SEO Products

        See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

      • Moz Data

        Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

      Save 36% now!
      Moz Pro

      Save 36% now!

      Sign up
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis

        Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

      • Keyword Explorer

        Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

      • Link Explorer

        Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

      • Competitive Research

        Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

      • MozBar

        See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

      • More Free SEO Tools

        Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

      Save 36% now!
      Moz Pro

      Save 36% now!

      Sign up
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO

        The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

      • SEO Learning Center

        Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

      • On-Demand Webinars

        Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

      • How-To Guides

        Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

      • Moz Academy

        Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

      • MozCon

        Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

      Access 20 years of data with flexible pricing
      Moz API

      Access 20 years of data with flexible pricing

      Find your plan
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers

        Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

      • Small Business Solutions

        Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

      • Agency Solutions

        Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

      • Enterprise Solutions

        Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

      • The Moz Story

        Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

      • New Releases

        Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

      Surface actionable competitive intel
      New Feature

      Surface actionable competitive intel

      Learn More
    • Log in
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Dashboard
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Dashboard
      • Moz Academy
    • Avatar
      • Moz Home
      • Notifications
      • Account & Billing
      • Manage Users
      • Community Profile
      • My Q&A
      • My Videos
      • Log Out

    The Moz Q&A Forum

    • Forum
    • Questions
    • Users
    • Ask the Community

    Welcome to the Q&A Forum

    Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

    1. Home
    2. SEO Tactics
    3. Technical SEO
    4. Is using a Href in Div OK?

    Moz Q&A is closed.

    After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

    Is using a Href in Div OK?

    Technical SEO
    4
    7
    4656
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as question
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
    • James77
      James77 last edited by

      Hi,

      I was just wondering what your thoughts are on using a Href in a Div, which contains anchor text. We currently use the Href on the div, as opposed to just the anchor text as I want the whole div to be clickable as opposed to just the anchor text.

      So currently I have:

      Keword 1
      Keyword 2

      Is this perfectly fine to do it like this as opposed to using <a tags="" ???<br="">I suppose there are various alternatives - if you must use the</a><a tag="" like:<="" p=""></a>

      <a tag="" like:<="" p=""></a>

      Keword 1
      Keyword 2

      However I would assume a search engine is smart enought to know its the same thing???

      Thanks

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • James77
        James77 @James77 last edited by

        Many thanks - I'm going to have a serious word with my coders!!

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
        • RyanKent
          RyanKent @James77 last edited by

          As Dave shared, the W3C is the official organization for determining the validity of code. Generally speaking, you want your code to be valid.

          If you want an area to be a click-able link try Maximise's suggestion.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
          • James77
            James77 @RyanKent last edited by

            Jesus - Thanks.

            So your telling me that its totally invalud to:
            1/. Wrap a href tag around a div tag.

            2/. Put a href tag as an atribute on a div tag.

            If that is the case I'm going to have so serious words with my coders!!

            RyanKent James77 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • blackballonline
              blackballonline last edited by

              Any time I have a question about valid HTML I go to the Source. W3C has an invaluable tool for HTML . Becoming familiar with this will help you always create clean code.

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
              • Maximise
                Maximise last edited by

                I would try and stay clear of doing this to be honest. It won't validate, older browsers may have problems with it and I'm not sure how search engines would treat it (they may not follow it). There are better ways to do it.

                If you set your anchor tag to 'display:block' you can then set the height and width too. This way the whole div would be the link, not just the text.

                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
                • RyanKent
                  RyanKent last edited by

                  Neither option is valid HTML. Browser behavior and crawler behavior would be unpredictable.

                  The code would be something like:

                  Keword 1
                    

                  James77 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                  • 1 / 1
                  • First post
                    Last post

                  Got a burning SEO question?

                  Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


                  Start my free trial


                  Browse Questions

                  Explore more categories

                  • Moz Tools

                    Chat with the community about the Moz tools.

                  • SEO Tactics

                    Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers

                  • Community

                    Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!

                  • Digital Marketing

                    Chat about tactics outside of SEO

                  • Research & Trends

                    Dive into research and trends in the search industry.

                  • Support

                    Connect on product support and feature requests.

                  • See all categories

                  Related Questions

                  • Easigrass

                    Should I use a canonical URL for images uploaded to a blog post in Wordpress?

                    Hi, I have a wordpress website that has articles/news posts witch contain imagery. I've noticed that in the Media Library, when you upload an image to a blog post it generates a new permalink ...article-name/article-image-01.jpg I have Yoast SEO plugin and have the option to set a canonical URL for this image. Should I point it back to the actual article? Thanks for any helpers with this.

                    Technical SEO | | Easigrass
                    0
                  • amastone

                    Canonical tag use for ecommerce product page detail

                    Hi, I have a category page I want to rank. This page has 24 different products quite similar but not exactly the same.
                    I want to use canonical tag in any product to the parent category. 
                    Is this a right use of the canonical? 
                    Category page I'm talking about is : Finger bits If I understand how to use canonical tags I can improve all my category pages. thanks marco

                    Technical SEO | | amastone
                    0
                  • Nanook1

                    Is it better to use XXX.com or XXX.com/index.html as canonical page

                    Is it better to use 301 redirects or canonical page? I suspect canonical is easier. The question is, which is the best canonical page, YYY.com or YYY.com/indexhtml? I assume YYY.com, since there will be many other pages such as YYY.com/info.html, YYY.com/services.html, etc.

                    Technical SEO | | Nanook1
                    0
                  • Dan-Lawrence

                    Custom hreflang tags in WP & using with Yoast

                    Hi My clients dev has added custom fields for adding hreflang tags to head of pages such as: "Rel Type", "The URL", and "Language Code" Am i right in thinking that until a different language/country version of the site is created these can remain empty or should they still be populated once added say with some sort of global reference or best left blank since will leave the head content global by default ? Also how important is it to add charset to the language code ? since seems optional ? Also this set up is on WP multi-site with Yoast and devs asked me the below: _One thing to note is that Yoast generates its own "canonical" tags - so if _
                    _you are going to use hreflang tags and canonical tags then you don't need to _
                    _add a canonical using the custom fields I have set up - Yoast has that _
                    sorted. _But if you are going down the route of NOT having any canonical tags - and _
                    _using a x-defult for the hreflang tags, I will need to try and suppress the _
                    _Yoast canonical tag so you can do this. Much depends on your approach and _
                    what you think is best. So how do i know if using canonicals or x-default, i take it best simplest to leverage Yoast and hence not add canonicals to custom fields ? Isnt x-default just for indicating language selectors/redirector not specific to 1 region? So long as havnt got those then good to proceed with Yoasts generated canonicals ? Cheers dan

                    Technical SEO | | Dan-Lawrence
                    0
                  • malinkymedia

                    Using the word "FREE" in domain name

                    Hi, This may seem like a simple question but a new client of mine wishes to use a domain name with the word "free" in it. The website will offer free activity vouchers. I couldn't see this being a problem as there a lot of websites that do this although he was told it may present a problem with the search engines thinking the site was spammy. It won't be and will be offering information and vouchers on local sporting activities. I was wondering if anybody could clarify this please so I can give him a more definitive answer to his question. Thanks for your help.

                    Technical SEO | | malinkymedia
                    0
                  • vernonmack

                    Using video transcripts v captions and avoiding duplicate content?

                    Part 1: After editing a You Tube transcript, I typically re-upload as a caption file (with time codes)...for SEO does it matter whether you upload as a transcript v. captions?  Is one better than the other? Part 2:  If you upload a transcript (or caption) to YouTube, then post that video/transcript in your blog, wouldn't you get pinged for duplicate content?

                    Technical SEO | | vernonmack
                    0
                  • Archers

                    I can buy a domain from a competitor. Whats the best way to make good use of these links for my existing website

                    I can buy a domain from a competitor. Whats the best way to make good use of these links for my existing website

                    Technical SEO | | Archers
                    0
                  • PlusPort

                    Text in div

                    When you use text in a div like this: <div id="container"> <h1 id="doc-header">Your Business in your Location - Your Services</h1> <p>Top industries are getting hit.p> <div id="branding"> <a href="#"> <img id="logo" src="images/logo.png" alt="Your Site" /> </a> </div> Are there SEO consequences when you put text in divs?

                    Technical SEO | | PlusPort
                    0

                  Get started with Moz Pro!

                  Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

                  Start my free trial
                  Products
                  • Moz Pro
                  • Moz Local
                  • Moz API
                  • Moz Data
                  • STAT
                  • Product Updates
                  Moz Solutions
                  • SMB Solutions
                  • Agency Solutions
                  • Enterprise Solutions
                  • Digital Marketers
                  Free SEO Tools
                  • Domain Authority Checker
                  • Link Explorer
                  • Keyword Explorer
                  • Competitive Research
                  • Brand Authority Checker
                  • Local Citation Checker
                  • MozBar Extension
                  • MozCast
                  Resources
                  • Blog
                  • SEO Learning Center
                  • Help Hub
                  • Beginner's Guide to SEO
                  • How-to Guides
                  • Moz Academy
                  • API Docs
                  About Moz
                  • About
                  • Team
                  • Careers
                  • Contact
                  Why Moz
                  • Case Studies
                  • Testimonials
                  Get Involved
                  • Become an Affiliate
                  • MozCon
                  • Webinars
                  • Practical Marketer Series
                  • MozPod
                  Connect with us

                  Contact the Help team

                  Join our newsletter
                  Moz logo
                  © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
                  • Accessibility
                  • Terms of Use
                  • Privacy

                  Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.