Title: Using H1 instead of H2 inside ARTICLE
Last modified: June 13, 2017

---

# Using H1 instead of H2 inside ARTICLE

 *  Resolved [mclaurent](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mclaurent/)
 * (@mclaurent)
 * [9 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/using-in-instead-of/)
 * Hi
 * I think we should be using <h1>s for the article title inside <article>, as Google
   no longer penalises for the (valid) repeated use of H1s in a HTML document.
 * Would it be possible to update this in the respective files please?
    For instance:
   website/wp-content/themes/tiny-framework/template-parts/content.php:54 website/
   wp-content/themes/tiny-framework/template-parts/content.php:23
 * References:
    Google has no problems with multiple h1s: [https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/webmasters/BmyI8YX_25A/81hZNQFJDQAJ](https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/webmasters/BmyI8YX_25A/81hZNQFJDQAJ)
   Each article should have its own h1: [https://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/8577/html5-semantics-h1-or-h2-for-article-titles-in-a-section](https://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/8577/html5-semantics-h1-or-h2-for-article-titles-in-a-section)
   SemPress Themee apparently always uses h1 in latest version: [https://github.com/pfefferle/SemPress/blob/master/sempress/entry-header.php](https://github.com/pfefferle/SemPress/blob/master/sempress/entry-header.php)
   W3 with multiple h1s [https://www.w3.org/TR/html5/sections.html#the-article-element](https://www.w3.org/TR/html5/sections.html#the-article-element)
    -  This topic was modified 9 years ago by [mclaurent](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mclaurent/).
    -  This topic was modified 9 years ago by [mclaurent](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mclaurent/).
    -  This topic was modified 9 years ago by [mclaurent](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mclaurent/).

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)

 *  Theme Author [Tomas Mackevicius](https://wordpress.org/support/users/tomasm/)
 * (@tomasm)
 * [9 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/using-in-instead-of/#post-9224853)
 * I made the decision to have only 1 H1 tag because of SEO concerns, but also because
   of the accessibility. You also had to see, that in the most important place –
   single article post – title gets H1, it’s on line 32.
 * > By using <h1>s for each section, you are semantically stating to
   >  screen reader
   > users that the sub-sections are equal to and parallel to the document title.
   > This is just not correct. Now if the outlining mechanisms worked, the browser
   > would appropriately present the section H1s as second level headings. But it
   > doesn’t work. There is no difference in how a heading structure would be presented
   > in an HTML4/XHTML document headings and in an HTML5 document with sectioning
   > elements (excepting that one version of JAWS that tried and failed miserably
   > to implement the outlining mechanism). So at present, using <h1>s everywhere
   > results in an incorrect document structure as presented to screen reader users
   > regardless of the flavor of HMTL used.
   > You asked how this impacts users…
   > It is a common strategy for screen reader users to quickly navigate to
   >  the
   > first <h1> in a document (typically by pressing the 1 key) to quickly determine
   > the document title. This almost always places focus directly at the beginning
   > of the main content area. They can also then navigate the <h2>s in a document(
   > typically by pressing the 2 key), etc. to determine the major page sections
   > and sub-sections. Additionally, the user can open a list of the headings and
   > can navigate/filter those headings by level.
   > If H1s are used to begin each sub-section, this functionality becomes
   >  much
   > more difficult as they cannot differentiate document and section headings (
   > and potentially sub-section and sub-sub section). The ability to quickly jump
   > to the document title and beginning of the main content is diminished. How 
   > can they know which of all the <h1>s is the document title and which are section
   > headings if they are presented identically?
   > This can also impact users that use keyboard enhancement extensions or
   >  voice
   > control to navigate by headings. They would expect that headings that appear
   > smaller and below larger headings to be sub-headings, when in your presented
   > structure they would be parallel headings.
 * [http://webaim.org/discussion/mail_thread?thread=6343](http://webaim.org/discussion/mail_thread?thread=6343)
 *  Thread Starter [mclaurent](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mclaurent/)
 * (@mclaurent)
 * [8 years, 12 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/using-in-instead-of/#post-9231091)
 * Hi Tomas
 * This was a really interesting read and I totally see where you are coming from.
   My only outstanding concern would be that the discussion on WebAIM are quiet 
   old, so it would be really interesting to know whether screen readers have since
   caught up with understanding sections.
 * Thanks for your time in investigating / responding to this!

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)

The topic ‘Using H1 instead of H2 inside ARTICLE’ is closed to new replies.

 * ![](https://i0.wp.com/themes.svn.wordpress.org/tiny-framework/2.3.1/screenshot.
   png)
 * Tiny Framework
 * [Support Threads](https://wordpress.org/support/theme/tiny-framework/)
 * [Active Topics](https://wordpress.org/support/theme/tiny-framework/active/)
 * [Unresolved Topics](https://wordpress.org/support/theme/tiny-framework/unresolved/)
 * [Reviews](https://wordpress.org/support/theme/tiny-framework/reviews/)

## Tags

 * [H1](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/h1/)
 * [html5](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/html5/)

 * 2 replies
 * 2 participants
 * Last reply from: [mclaurent](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mclaurent/)
 * Last activity: [8 years, 12 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/using-in-instead-of/#post-9231091)
 * Status: resolved