Google’s John Mueller recently gave a detailed explanation of image alt text seo in a Reddit post. In this article, we will explain why alt text is important for SEO, and why using AI is not the right approach to generate alt text.

Table of Contents

What is Alt Text?

Alternative text is an HTML attribute that is given for images. It is helpful for screen readers, which helps visually impaired users to understand web content. Apart from this, Google and other search engines also use it to understand the purpose of images.

W3C, which sets the standard for HTML, has a great way of explaining alt text:

If you play a web page over the phone to someone and they want them to understand the page, how would you write the alt text? Alt text is important for things that have informative value. Not for things that are just decorative

This means that if an image is relevant to the content on the page, the alt text will help explain its purpose.

Is Google Alt Text SEO?

A Reddit user raised the question: Despite advancements in computer vision and AI image recognition, is alt text SEO?

This is a good question, but Google’s John Mueller clarified that the context between the image and the page matters the most.

According to John Mueller:

“An image of a beach can have different meanings:

  • It can be a relaxing poster,
  • It can be an image of a hotel,
  • Or even the site of a chemical spill.

It is difficult to understand the purpose of an image through AI vision alone. That is why correct use of alt text seo is very important to give context to the image.”

Why is context important for SEO?

Search engines not only recognize images, but also want to understand their context. If a hotel website has an image that shows a beach, a better alt text than “photo of a beach” would be:

Luxury hotel with a private beach in Maldives

This kind of context-based alt text is better not just for SEO, but also for users. It is also helpful for people who use screen readers.

Is using AI better for generating alt text?

John Mueller also highlighted that using AI for alt text can be a weak approach, because:

AI will only describe the image, but will not understand context.

If AI just writes “photo of a beach” for every beach image, then there will be no benefit of SEO and accessibility.

Alt text generated by AI is general, while for SEO and user-friendliness it is important to write specific and relevant alt text.

“If you are using AI to generate alt text and generic text is coming for every image, then you are not taking full advantage of the alt text.” – John Mueller

Best Ways to Write Alt Text

If you want to write SEO-friendly and user-focused alt text seo for your website, then follow these tips:

  • Write the exact purpose of the image (avoid general description)
  • Use keywords naturally (do not do keyword stuffing)
  • Understand the context of the image and write the alt text accordingly
  • Manually optimize AI-generated alt text
  • Leave alt text blank for decorative images (alt text is not necessary for decorative images)

Best Examples of Alt Text

If a website has an image of a luxury hotel, then it is wrong and right An example of alt text could be this:

Good Alt Text

  • 5-star luxury beach resort in Maldives with private ocean view”
  • Apple MacBook Air M2 – 13-inch Retina Display, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD – Silver”

Bad Alt Text

  • Photo of a beach
  • Laptop image

By following these alt text seo best practices, you can greatly improve your image SEO and bring more organic traffic to your website!

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Conclusion

The summary of what Google’s John Mueller said is that alt text seo is not just for describing images, but also for understanding their context. If you are using AI, then ensure that you also manually optimize, otherwise you will not get the full benefit of SEO and accessibility.

If you want your website to get a good ranking in Google Image Search, then use correct and relevant alt text seo. This is important not only for SEO, but also for better user experience and web accessibility.

If you have any other questions, then do tell us in the comments!