HTML <i> element

The <i> element identifies text with a different quality from the surrounding prose, such as an alternate voice, a thought, a technical term, a phrase from another language, or a taxonomic name. It marks the nature of that text rather than stress within the sentence.

Browsers normally display <i> in italic. CSS can change its font style or other visual properties without changing the distinction made by the markup. Where italics are needed purely for visual design, the CSS font-style property can be applied to the element already containing the text.

A phrase presented in another language is a simple example. Here, the French expression déjà vu is marked with <i>. The lang="fr" attribute identifies its language and gives browsers and assistive technology information they can use when processing or pronouncing it. The <i> element alone does not identify a language.

The element is different from <em>. The <em> element marks stress emphasis. If the sentence changes meaning because one word is stressed, use <em>, not <i>.

More specific elements can identify other kinds of text. The title of a work can be marked with <cite>, and the defining occurrence of a term with <dfn>. Their default appearance may also be italic, but each expresses a more particular meaning.

Attributes: GLOBALS, including lang for text in another language.

Typical layout:
<p>
  We discussed the French expression
  <i lang="fr">déjà vu</i>.
</p>

Visual representation: