HTML <blockquote> element

The <blockquote> element represents a section of content quoted from another source. The quotation forms a separate block. For a quotation within a sentence, <q> is the inline element. The distinction is how the quotation fits into the document, rather than how many words it contains.

A block quotation may contain one paragraph or several paragraphs. It may also contain other flow content if the quoted material itself has that structure. The important point is that the whole block is being presented as borrowed speech, borrowed writing, or borrowed material.

The optional cite attribute can hold a URL for the source of the quotation. This is not normally shown as a visible link to the reader. It is mainly machine-readable information, so if the reader needs to see the source, a normal visible link should also be provided outside the quote.

Attribution should not be placed inside the <blockquote> element unless it is actually part of the quoted material. If the page says who wrote or said the quotation, that attribution belongs before or after the quotation, not inside the quotation itself.

The <blockquote> element should not be used merely to indent text. Browsers often display it with indentation by default, but indentation is not its meaning. If the text is not quoted from another source, CSS should do the visual work instead.

The element draws a boundary between the page author's voice and another source. In the example below, the quoted sentence comes from the HTML standard. The visible attribution names and links to that work, while the cite attribute records the source URL on the quotation itself.

Attributes: cite, GLOBALS.

Typical layout:
<blockquote cite="https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/grouping-content.html#the-p-element">
  <p>The p element represents a paragraph.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>— WHATWG,
  <cite><a href="https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/grouping-content.html#the-p-element">HTML Standard</a></cite>
</p>

Visual representation: