Image alt attributes check

What does the image alt attributes check do?

When you add images to your content, you’re trying to illustrate something. But, some of the visitors to your site may be visually impaired, and unable to see the image. And, search engines can’t see images either. There’s a solution: add a description of your image to the alt attribute. Yoast SEO comes with an image alt attributes assessment that checks if there are images in your post and whether these images have an alt text with the focus keyphrase. This improves accessibility and your chance of ranking in image search.

Easily improve the accessibility of your site!

Make sure your site is accessible for blind and visually impaired users
Help search engines find out what your content is about
Improve your chance of ranking in image search

Why are image alt attributes important?

The image alt attribute is part of the HTML image tag. It should describe what’s on the image and the function of the image on the page, like this:

<img src=“image.jpg” alt=“image description”>

They improve the accessibility of your website

Image alt attributes are used by screen readers, which are browsers used by blind and visually impaired people. Screen readers tell them what is on the image by reading this attribute. So, if you don’t add alt text to your images, blind and visually impaired people won’t know what the image is about. To make your website accessible for everyone, it’s important to add a description of your images and their purpose to the alt attributes.

They help search engines find out what your content is about

Search engines need the alt attributes of your images, too. They use it to determine what the image shows and how it relates to the surrounding text. So, these attributes help search engines with finding out what your content is about. And search engines need that information to determine your place in the search results. Therefore, adding alt attributes can help you rank higher.

The image alt attributes assessment in Yoast SEO

Yoast SEO helps you remember to add relevant alt text to your images. The plugin comes with an image alt attributes assessment, which checks if there are images in your post and whether these images have an alt attribute containing the focus keyphrase, to make sure your alt text reflects the topic of your page or post.

The Yoast SEO plugin will then give you feedback: it will tell you whether your images have alt attributes and if the alt text is relevant to the topic of your page or post. The only thing left for you to do is add some relevant alt text. This will not only make your site more accessible; it will also help with your rankings!