What Are Header Tags? How to Use H1 to H6 for SEO

Header tags are the HTML heading elements, <h1> through <h6>, that mark the titles and subtitles on a web page. The H1 names the page’s main topic, H2s mark its main sections, and H3 to H6 break those sections into smaller parts. Together they form an outline that helps readers scan, helps people using assistive technology move around the page, and helps search engines understand how the content fits together.

Headings are one piece of on-page SEO. This guide is the practical version: what each level is for, how to build a clean hierarchy, what Google actually says about headings, and the mistakes we see most on small business sites.

What Header Tags Are

In HTML, a heading looks like this: <h2>Our Services</h2>. There are six levels. The number is the rank, not the size: an H2 is a main section, an H3 is a part of that section, and so on. Browsers style them larger by default, but your theme decides how they actually look.

The MDN reference for heading elements describes the six levels in detail. In practice, most pages only need H1, H2 and H3. H4 to H6 are there for long, detailed pages such as manuals or documentation.

Tag	What it’s for	Example on a plumbing service page
H1	The main topic of the page	Water Heater Repair in Indianapolis
H2	A main section	Signs Your Water Heater Needs Repair
H3	A part of an H2 section	No Hot Water
H4 to H6	Finer detail inside an H3, rarely needed	Gas Models vs. Electric Models

How Heading Hierarchy Works

Think of headings as the table of contents for the page. Each H2 should make sense as a section of the H1’s topic. Each H3 should make sense as part of the H2 above it. If you pulled only the headings out of the page, a reader should still understand what it covers and in what order.

Here’s a clean outline for a local service page:

• H1: Garage Door Repair in Encinitas
• H2: Common Garage Door Problems We Fix
• H3: Broken Springs
• H3: Off-Track Doors
• H3: Openers That Won’t Respond
• H2: How a Repair Visit Works
• H2: Areas We Serve
• H2: Frequently Asked Questions

The W3C’s accessibility tutorial on headings recommends nesting headings by their rank and says skipping ranks “can be confusing and should be avoided where possible.” Going from an H2 straight to an H4 is the usual example. Going back up is fine: after the last H3 in a section, the next section starts with a new H2.

One Clear H1 Per Page

The H1 is the page’s headline. We recommend one clear H1 that says what the page is about in plain words, because it gives every reader, including people using screen readers, a single obvious starting point.

Tips for a good H1:

• Say what the page covers, using the words a customer would search. “Water Heater Repair in Indianapolis” beats “Welcome!”
• Keep it close to the page’s title tag, but it doesn’t have to match word for word. The title tag is written for the search results; the H1 is written for someone already on the page.
• Don’t stuff it. One service and one place is plenty.
• Make sure it’s real text, not part of an image.

A WordPress note: most WordPress themes output the post or page title as the H1 automatically. That means the first heading you add in the editor should usually be an H2. If you add another H1 in the content, you end up with two. Check your live page to see what your theme does.

Using H2 and H3 Subheadings

Subheadings do most of the work on a page. They break long text into sections people can scan, so a visitor looking for one answer can find it without reading everything.

Write subheadings that describe the section, not clever labels. “How Much Does a New Roof Cost?” tells the reader what’s below. “Let’s Talk Numbers” doesn’t. Questions customers actually ask make good H2s and H3s, especially in an FAQ section, and they naturally include the words people search with. There’s no need to force a keyword into every heading.

Header Tags and Accessibility

Headings matter most to people who can’t scan a page visually. The W3C notes that browsers, plug-ins and assistive technologies can use headings to provide in-page navigation. Many screen reader users jump from heading to heading to find the section they want, the way sighted visitors skim.

That only works if the headings are real heading elements in a logical order. Two common problems break it:

• Fake headings: text that’s been made bold and large so it looks like a heading but isn’t marked up as one. Assistive technology can’t find it.
• Headings used for styling: a sentence set as an H3 just because the designer liked the font size. It adds a fake section to the outline. Use your theme’s font size settings instead.

What Google Says About Headings

Google’s guidance on headings is short and practical. Its SEO Starter Guide says that from Google Search’s perspective, “it doesn’t matter if you’re using them out of order,” and that “there’s also no magical, ideal amount of headings a given page should have.” It adds that if you think you’re using too many, you probably are.

Headings do play a part in how Google presents a page. Google’s documentation on title links lists heading elements, such as the H1, among the sources it uses when it generates the clickable title for a search result. A clear H1 that matches the page’s topic supports a clear title link.

The takeaway: headings help Google understand the structure of a page, but there’s no heading formula that ranks. Use them to make the page clear for readers, keep them in a sensible order for accessibility, and spend your effort on the content under them. Our guide to SEO content covers that part.

Common Header Tag Mistakes

These come up on almost every site audit we do:

• Two H1s because the theme outputs the title and someone added another H1 in the content.
• No H1 at all, or the logo wrapped in an H1 on every page.
• Skipped levels, such as an H2 followed directly by an H4.
• Sidebar and footer widgets marked up as H2s or H3s, which clutters the outline of every page.
• Headings that say nothing, like “Overview,” “More Info” or “Welcome.”
• The same keyword crammed into every heading, which reads badly and helps no one.

How to Check Your Header Tags

You don’t need special software to check headings:

1. Open the live page in Chrome, right-click a heading and choose Inspect to see which tag it uses.
2. Use a free headings or accessibility browser extension to list every heading on the page in order.
3. In the WordPress block editor, open the List View or Document Overview to see the heading outline of a post.
4. Read just the headings top to bottom. If they don’t tell the story of the page, rewrite them.

Headings are one part of a broader page audit. Our on-page SEO guide covers titles, descriptions, images and more, and our guide to technical SEO covers crawling and indexing. Descriptive headings also hint at good anchor text when you link to a page, which our article on internal linking explains. If a page loads slowly or jumps around while loading, see our guide to Core Web Vitals.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can a page have more than one H1?

HTML allows it, and some themes produce more than one. We still recommend one clear H1 per page, because it gives readers and screen reader users a single obvious main topic. If your theme already outputs the title as an H1, start your content headings at H2.

Does heading order affect rankings?

Google says that from a Search perspective it doesn’t matter if headings are used out of order. Order still matters for accessibility, since people using assistive technology rely on a logical outline, so keep levels in sequence anyway.

How many headings should a page have?

As many as the content needs. Google says there’s no ideal number of headings. A short page might have three H2s; a long guide might have ten with H3s under some of them. If headings start appearing every two sentences, you probably have too many.

Should every heading include my keyword?

No. Use the words customers would use where they fit naturally, especially in the H1. Forcing the same keyword into every heading makes the page harder to read and doesn’t make it more relevant.

What’s the difference between the title tag and the H1?

The title tag sits in the page’s code and is the main source for the headline in search results. The H1 is the visible main heading on the page. They should describe the same topic, but they can be worded differently.

Get Help With Your Site’s Structure

Local Blitz has worked on SEO for local businesses since 2009, from offices in San Diego (Encinitas) and Indianapolis. We review page structure, headings and content across your site and fix what’s getting in the way, as part of our SEO work. There are no cookie-cutter packages, and plans are month-to-month. Book a free strategy call and we’ll tell you what we see, even if the answer is that you can handle it yourself.