HTML Tags
HTML <acronym> Tag
The <acronym> tag was used to mark acronyms in older HTML, but it is deprecated and has been removed from HTML5. Use the <abbr> tag instead.
The <acronym> Tag
The <acronym> element was historically used to indicate a sequence of characters that make up an acronym, with its expansion supplied via the title attribute. It behaved much like <abbr>.
Because HTML5 unified abbreviations and acronyms under a single element, <acronym> is now obsolete. Browsers may still display it, but you should not use it in new documents.
⚠️
The <acronym> tag is deprecated and obsolete in HTML5. Do not use it. Use <abbr> instead, which works everywhere and is the standard, accessible choice.
Syntax (Deprecated)
Example
<!-- Do not use this in new code -->
<acronym title="North Atlantic Treaty Organization">NATO</acronym>Modern Replacement Example
Example
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<body>
<p>
<abbr title="North Atlantic Treaty Organization">NATO</abbr>
is used with the modern abbr tag.
</p>
<p>Hover over NATO to see the expansion.</p>
</body>
</html>More Examples
Example
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<body>
<p>
The <abbr title="Portable Document Format">PDF</abbr> standard is widely used.
</p>
</body>
</html>Key Takeaways
- <acronym> is deprecated and removed from HTML5.
- Do not use it in new documents.
- <abbr> is its direct modern replacement.
- Migrate existing <acronym> tags to <abbr>.
- Both use the title attribute for the expansion.