How to Add Alt Tags to WordPress Images (Alt Text Attribute)

Have you ever thought about how Google interprets the pictures on your website? Or how a screen reader describes images to those with vision impairments? And what happens if a graphic fails to load on your site?

If you set helpful alt text, then search engines and visitors will see or hear a description of the image. If not, then they won’t be able to understand what’s happening in the picture.

But what is alt text? In this guide, we’ll answer this question, show you how to add alt text on WordPress, and provide actionable best practices to ensure that your images are optimized for visitors and search engines.

What is alt text?

Alt text, or “alternative text,” is a short description assigned to an image on a website. It serves three primary purposes:

1. To improve accessibility: Visitors with visual impairments often rely on screen readers to interact with a website. When encountering an image, these tools read the alt text aloud.
2. To help with SEO: Search engines use alt text to understand the content of an image and, ultimately, better interpret your website.
3. To provide context if an image fails to load: If something goes wrong and a picture doesn’t load, alt text will appear on the page.

Adding alt text to all of your images ensures that your website is accessible to all visitors and search engines. It’s a critical task for every single site, from hobby blogs to ecommerce stores and enterprise-level businesses.

A step-by-step guide to adding alt text in WordPress

There are two ways that you can add image alt text in WordPress.

1. Add alt text through the Media Library

1. In your WordPress dashboard, go to Media → Library.
2. Click on an image to view more details.
3. Locate the Alternative Text field in the right-hand panel.
4. Add concise, descriptive text that explains the image’s content.
   • Example: For an image of a cat sleeping on a couch, you could write: “Gray tabby cat sleeping on a blue couch.”

2. Add alt text when inserting an image into a post or page

1. Open the post or page where you want to add the image.
2. Click the blue “Toggle block inserter” icon at the top left and add an Image block to the page.
3. Upload your image.
4. In the settings panel on the right, you’ll see a field for “alternative text.” Add your description here.
5. Save or publish your page or post as usual.

Best practices for writing effective alt text

There are some best practices you should follow in order to make your alt text effective for search engines and those who are visually impaired. Here are some tips:

• Keep it concise. While there are recommendations for ideal alt text length, it should be as long as necessary to convey the subject of the image. That said, be as concise and succinct as possible, and avoid unnecessary phrases like “image of” and “picture of.”
• Be specific and descriptive. Imagine that you’re not able to see an image — what text would help you understand what’s going on? Avoid stuffing alt text with keywords, and instead be as descriptive as possible.

• Good example: “A stack of pancakes with maple syrup and fresh blueberries.”
• Bad example: “Breakfast.”
• Include keywords naturally. Use keywords relevant to your content for SEO purposes but avoid using them too often.
  • Example: If your keyword is “golden retriever”, you might say, “Golden retriever puppy playing in a grassy park.”
• Skip decorative images. Leave the alt text field empty for images that are purely decorative — e.g. a dotted line. Alternatively, use the aria-hidden=”true” attribute to exclude them from screen readers.

Tools to simplify alt text management

There are some tools available to help you better write and manage alt text on your WordPress site. Here are some great options:

• WP Accessibility: Enhances sitewide accessibility and simplifies alt text management
• Yoast SEO: Identifies missing or ineffective alt text and provides optimization tips
• WAVE Accessibility Tool: Identifies missing alt text and other accessibility issues
• Google Lighthouse: Provides reports on site accessibility, including alt text checks

How alt text impacts SEO

We’ve touched on this a bit already, but alt text is important for search engine optimization. After all, bots can’t actually “see” an image, so alt text is the only way they can understand it. 

Keep in mind that Google’s goal is to show the most relevant results for each individual’s search query. When you include alt text, you add context to each image on a page, showing search engines that it has a purpose and enhances the experience for readers. If you tastefully and effectively include target keywords in your alt text, you can also encourage Google to display your photos in image search results for terms that make sense.

Plus, Google prioritizes the user experience, which includes accessibility. So if your alt text is descriptive and helpful, that’s also a big plus. 

Reminder: Always write your alt text for humans first! So if it doesn’t make sense to include a keyword, leave it out.

Alt Text vs Title Text vs Caption: What’s the difference?

Many WordPress users confuse these three fields. Here is how Google and Screen Readers generally treat them:

Attribute	Audience	SEO Value	When to Use
Alt Text	Screen Readers & Search Bots	⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (Critical)	ALWAYS (unless decorative). Describes the image content.
Title Text	Tooltip (Hover)	⭐ (Negligible)	Optional. Used for internal media organization.
Caption	Human Readers	⭐⭐⭐ (High context)	When you need to add context, credit, or humor visible on the page.

Unlock better SEO content with Jetpack AI Assistant

Adding alt text to your images in WordPress is essential, but creating concise, descriptive, SEO-friendly text for pages, posts, and images can be time-consuming. Let’s take a moment to explore a tool that can help: Jetpack AI Assistant.

Designed to work seamlessly within WordPress, Jetpack AI Assistant can significantly streamline the process of writing alt text and other content.

Let’s say you want to write alt text that includes a specific keyword. All you have to do is use the AI Assistant block to write a prompt, and Jetpack will take care of the rest! You can see an example of that in action below:

Jetpack AI Assistant can also help you accomplish a wide range of other tasks, like creating product descriptions, editing the tone of blog posts, brainstorming social media post ideas, and generating tables from sets of data. 

Ready to take the next step in optimizing your content workflow? Learn more about Jetpack AI Assistant.

Frequently asked questions

What is the main difference between alt text and title text in WordPress?

The difference lies in who uses the text and how it functions on your website. Alt text, or alternative text, is a description used by screen readers for visually impaired users and by search engines to understand the image content. It is critical for accessibility and SEO. Title text is an attribute that creates a small pop-up tool-tip when a user hovers their mouse over an image.

Search engines like Google prioritize alt text because it helps them index your content accurately. Title text does not have a direct impact on your search rankings. You can often leave the title text blank unless you specifically want a hover effect for your desktop visitors.

How long should my alt text be for the best results?

You should aim for a description that is concise yet descriptive. Most screen readers stop reading after about 125 characters. This means you need to get your main point across quickly. You do not need to write a full paragraph or a long story about the image.

Focus on the most important details that a user would miss if they could not see the image. If you find yourself writing more than one or two short sentences, you might be providing too much detail. Keep it simple and focused on the visual facts. If the image is very complex, like a chart or a graph, explain the data in the main text of your article instead of trying to fit it all into the image tag.

What should I do with alt text for decorative background images?

If an image is purely for decoration and adds no new information to the content, you should leave the alt text empty. This includes things like dividers, swooshes, colored shapes, or generic icons that only exist to make the page look nice. In the HTML code, this creates a “null” attribute.

When a screen reader encounters an empty alt attribute, it will completely skip the image. This is the correct behavior. You do not want to annoy a visually impaired user by forcing their device to read out “blue curved line” or “decorative flower” while they are trying to listen to your article. By leaving it blank, you keep the audio experience clean and focused on your actual written content.

Is it possible to bulk update alt text for all my old images at once?

WordPress does not have a built-in feature to update alt text for hundreds of images at once. You usually have to open images one by one in the Media Library to fix them. However, there are third-party plugins available that can help you view a list of all your images and edit the text fields on a single screen.

Do filenames matter if I already have good alt text?

Yes, the filename is actually the very first clue you give to search engines about your image content. Before you even upload a photo to WordPress, you should rename the file on your computer. A name like “IMG_5932.jpg” tells Google absolutely nothing. A name like “chocolate-chip-cookie-recipe.jpg” gives a strong signal about the content.

Alt text and filenames work together. The filename provides a broad label, while the alt text provides the specific description. If you skip renaming your files, you force the alt text to do all the heavy lifting alone. It is a best practice to use hyphens between words in your filenames so that search engines can read the individual words clearly.

How do I write alt text for an image that has text inside it?

If your image contains written words, such as a quote, a screenshot of an email, or a button that says “Buy Now,” your alt text should include that exact words. This is because screen readers cannot always read the text that is “flattened” inside a picture file. You need to type it out for them.

For example, if you upload a picture of a inspirational quote, your alt text should simply repeat the quote. If you do not do this, a visually impaired user will know there is an image there, but they will have no idea what the words say. Your goal is to ensure that someone listening to the page gets the exact same information as someone looking at it.

Will fixing my alt text help my images appear in Google Images?

Fixing your descriptions is one of the most effective way to rank in Google Images. Search bots rely almost entirely on your written words to index visual content. They look at the text surrounding the image and the alt attribute itself to decide if the picture is relevant to a search query.

If you sell products or run a recipe blog, this is especially important. Many users start their search in the Images tab to find a product they like the look of. If your product photo has a detailed description, it is much more likely to show up there. This can bring a significant amount of new visitors to your site who might never have found your text articles otherwise.

Should I include “image of” or “picture of” in my alt text?

You should not include phrases like “image of” or “picture of” in your text. Screen reading software already announces that it is looking at an image before it reads your text. If you write “Image of a red car,” the user will hear “Image: Image of a red car.” This is repetitive and wastes time.

Instead, jump straight into the description. Just write “Red sports car driving on a highway.” This is more direct and respects the user’s time. The only exception is if the medium is important to the context. For instance, you might clarify if something is a “Illustration of,” “Chart showing,” or “Painting of,” because that specific detail changes how the user interprets the visual information.