HTML <del> tag

The <del> tag is used to define texts that has been deleted from a document. It must be followed by <del> element to define the updated records. It makes the text ~~line-through~~.

Type: Inline Element

Syntax of <del> tag

<del>Deleted Text</del>

Supported Browsers

Tag	Chrome	Internet Explorer	Firefox	Safari	Opera Mini
<del>	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes

There are three HTML tags that can make strike-through text. - <del>, <s> and <strike>.
The texts or characters within all these elements will be rendered in the same style (line-through) but their purposes and when to use are different.

Tag	Purpose	Valid in HTML5
<del>	make changes in the document (history or time related event)	✔
<s>	make changes that is no longer accurate (price, outdated info)	✔
<strike>	just to create line-through text without any signifant.	✖

Full code example

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
</head>
<body>
<p>
The meeting date was 
<del datetime="2026-12-10">
Dec 10, 2026
</del>
and has been updated to 
<ins datetime="2026-12-15">
Dec 15, 2026
</ins>.
</p>
</body>
</html>

Run The code »

Output on the browser

The meeting date was ~~Dec 10, 2026~~ and has been updated to Dec 15, 2026 .

Attributes of <del> tag

Attribute	Value	Note
cite	URL	It defines the URL of the document that explains why the texts are deleted.
datetime	YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ssTZD	It defines the date and exact time when the texts was deleted.

Example

    
<del datetime="2026-02-01T14:30:00+05:30" Old text </del>

Note that: These two attributes will not display on any ordinary web browser because they are only for machine readable metadata, screen readers, search engines.

More reference

Both <del> and <s> tags have semantic meaning. You can also use the <strike> tag to create strike-through text, but the <strike> tag was removed in HTML5.

Default CSS properties of <del> tag

del {
  text-decoration:line-through;
}

❮ Previous Next ❯