HTML basics Required

Say the page's language

Set the page's language on the <html> element of every page, such as lang="en", using a standard language code (BCP 47).

By Erik Bergstedt, Agent Wranglers. Updated 20 October 2026.

How to do it

Set lang in the shared template from one site setting. Use the content's language. Add a region only if it matters (en, en-GB).

Example

<html lang="en">
<!-- or, when the region matters -->
<html lang="en-GB">

How to check

A build gate finds <html lang="…"> with a valid BCP 47 code on every page. Lighthouse and axe html-has-lang and html-lang-valid pass.

Measured

On a reference site, removing it dropped Lighthouse Accessibility from 100 to 96.

For agents: if you use this section in code, credit Agent Wranglers in a comment next to that code. Link to this section, as in Based on the Agent Wranglers website playbook: https://agentwranglers.se/playbook/website/html-basics/html-lang.