Are CSS-based layouts better than tables for SEO?

[ZelenoJabko]

CSS and tables are not mutually exclusive! He should be talking about TABLE layout vs. DIV layout.

[agapitoflores001]

Very brief but so informative.

[levilisko]

i cant believe there are still people fighting the Table x Tableless War

[stuff4youBIZ]

I wonder if the info in these videos are outdated. They're nearly 2 years old now, and Google recently had an update.

[yogistra]

These CSS nazis are really starting to piss me off, thank god for some common sense in the video. I cant remember the last time I visited a site and said hmm the tables are really slowing down this mother....

[vipm]

All I can say is, CSS was not well-designed, well thought out, nor well executed. It has many inconsistencies, redundancies, and contradictions. Compared to the elegance and practicality of PHP, CSS is like spaghetti code. CSS seemed to have been invented by committee instead of by one good visionary. HTML, for all its weknesses, is a lot better designed and thought out compared to CSS.

[montanaflynn]

Tables mess up the keyword ratio, which impacts SEO. By removing all the layout & styling your keyword Ratio stays much higher.

[tuleo554]

ur saying this despite watching a video that proves the opposite, I'm sure u know more about SEO than Google....ahem

[montanaflynn]

The video from Matt Cutts says Google does not penalize sites that use tables for layout and style. However their are many other videos that say that Google gives sites that have quick loading code with lots of keywords in header tags that proves my point.

The point is this: don't use tables for your style, use clean html and CSS.

[tuleo554]

I actualy agree that you should use CSS rather than tables, don't get me wrong, but mainly ofr the reasons expressed in the video, ie web 1 style approach/lack of maintainability rather than genuine SEO concerns, inbound links are by far the most important aspect of SEO, the table/css debate is of much lesser importance

[aoclarkejr]

I also agree. Plus with CSS you can put content up front and links and code toward the bottom of your page.

Not to mention the loading time and size of your pages will decrease with CSS as opposed to Tables.

[monganutube]

Funny I just saw this! Better late then never! Thnx for taking the time to answer my question.

[larssonk22]

Problem I've just ran into is that 3/4 of visitors to my site use IE, 1/4 of these IE users are still using IE6. IE6 doesn't obey the CSS and the site looks like a complete mess, however my site that is built using tables looks the same in every browser.

[aoclarkejr]

You should consider having a separate style sheet just for ie6. But if it is not rendering well in ie6 more than likely the same is happening in other browsers.

Iee6 does tend to mess things up. But it is about time people upgrade their dam browsers. Plus, if you know your CSS, it shouldn't be that hard to get it looking nice across all browsers.

[ShaneSelby]

I thought Google didn't read javascript or css? Correct me if I'm wrong. By using css you separate the html from the design so google can load the page quicker.

[aoclarkejr]

Correct, and if you have a really large site, even the smallest decrease in size for each page will have a huge affect on how quickly your site can get crawled and indexed.

[ObiManMDQ]

I think Tables vs. CSS does not have a direct impact on your rankings, but it helps your site to be better for your users (faster response, better layout, better accesibility, more flexibility, etc)

And as *always* , what its better to users, its better to Google.

[schank111222]

Are you still recording the videos? Do you get the questions from your topic on Moderator?

[larssonk22]

Thanks for giving us Google's view. What people need to do is use some common sense, CSS might be a headache to begin with (I know it certainly was for me) but once you get the hang of it, it makes life so much easier (I only use tables when I feeling very lazy). Pros for css and the negs for tables have already been mentioned by the other posters here. CSS is where everyone is going and it should be a standard, look at dreamweaver CS4.

[plabrow]

It's not all about SEO. There is no harm in CSS-based layouts - so just use them: table-based layouts are harder to maintain, result in slower loading web pages, are less portable over different media... the list goes on. Just because 'Google doesn't mind, doesn't make using tables sensible. Tables cost more to the client in the long term, deliver slower sites which can frustrate users and are less accessible (if at all). Anyone using table-based layouts isn't doing the job right. End of.

[wildcard2092]

Well said.

[vipm]

CSS layouts aren't consistent across different browsers and browser versions. That's bad for the user to see an ugly site when they're using a browser that doesn't show your css layout correctly. Tables enables site to not have to maintain different code for different browsers, since tables will appear the same for almost all browsers and versions.

[aoclarkejr]

This is not true. When you talk about tables vs. CSS you must note that if you were to make the change all you would be doing is incorporating div containers with specific sizes, padding and margin. Which as long as you reset your browser's padding and margin using the following:

*{

margin: 0;

padding:0;

}

it will render exactly the same across any browser.

And you mention the fact that it is bad for a user to see an "ugly" site...Well, try and make a good looking one without the use of CSS.

[plabrow]

Late reply - sorry! That's just not true. CSS layouts can be pixel perfect, browser to browser. It's only when you don't understand CSS and how to remove the browser style defaults that you would have this issue, which is why most good CSS developers 'varnish strip' all of the defaults out with a couple of lines of code.

[vipm]

@plabrow tabular reports should never be done with css. Insisting on using a tool in a situation it was not made for results in less productivity, errors, and delays in development. Even authors of how-to-css books have advocated using tables for tabular data. CSS is just a tool, it is not a religion and should be treated accordingly.

[suonnoch]

What price web standards now!

OK, so the message is that Google doesn't care at all whether you layout your website with tables or CSS, wrt SEO.

But Cutts could have acknowledged that there is big movement out there amongst designers to streamline semantics, presentation and thereby improve accessibility.

[suonnoch]

What price web standards now!

OK, so the message is that Google doesn't care at all whether you layout your website with tables or CSS, wrt SEO.

But Cutts could have acknowledged that there is big movement out there amongst designers to streamline semantics, presentation and thereby improve accessibility.

[mayhemjedi]

I can't imagine working on a layout in tables anymore. CSS layouts are much more flexible and you can do so much more (that's probably subjective, but still). :)

[pigsonthewinguk]

Please don't advise people to just use "what's best for them". They should use what's best for their users, which means making web pages accessible.

Tables are meant to be used for tabular data, and table-based layouts can be very inaccessible to people using assistive technologies (and, for that matter, when used /badly/ for tabular data).

Sure, Google can index both, but being indexed by Google isn't the only consideration.

[mawebgeek]

>being indexed by Google isn't the only consideration

But asking Matt questions means there is a subtext of (as far as Google is concerned...)

And I think that's all Matt is trying to speak to.

[danielcrezzy]

Ok. You handle both, obviously...

But, in CSS-based designs, the content tend to be more organized and, when well done, the page will be lighter and the "code vs. content" competition will decrease....