Best practice for creating hyperlinks

Hyperlinking (or linking) is a strategy for creating meaningful connections between content and supporting logical navigation whereby the user clicks on a linked word, phrase or image and is directed to a new location. This resource introduces some simple strategies that may be employed to create links that enhance content and are accessible to all students.

Why?

Effective hyperlinks can help to support logical organisation, navigation and interpretation of content. When created ineffectively, they are easy to miss or deem as unimportant which can result in students missing crucial content or information.

Creating accessible links is particularly important for people using assistive technologies (e.g. screen readers and mouse alternatives) which often compile a list of links on a page to simplify navigation. If the link text is not meaningful the user may end up with a list of links that include things like, ‘click here’ and ‘read more’ without any context.

Links are one of the most basic and common interactions that a user has with a web page, so creating links that are simple and accessible is important and easy to achieve by implementing the strategies in this guide.

How?

To create hyperlinks that support your students navigating content, consider the following strategies:

Write meaningful link text

• Write link text that provides a clear indication of the link destination.
• Your link text should match what is on the destination page so that it is easy for the user to determine whether they have reached the correct page.
• Only link the keywords in a sentence

This - Read more about writing meaningful link text.

Not this - Click here for more information about writing meaningful link text.

Provide context

Where practical, put the linked text at the end of the sentence so the student gets the context before they get to the link.

For call-to-action links, provide a short description of what the link does – e.g. Click here to register

Link emails, not names

To hyperlink an email address, make the link text the email address, not the name. This will ensure it is not mistaken for a link to another website.

This - Contact LTC at ltc-central@uow.edu.au

Not this - Contact LTC