HTML & Semantic Markup — Prerequisites

What You Need Before Starting

1. Basic computer literacy (required)

Being comfortable creating a folder, saving a file with a specific extension (.html), and opening a file in a web browser. That's genuinely the entire technical bar to start — HTML is designed to be a first language, not a second one.

2. A text editor (required, but nothing to "learn" yet)

Any plain text editor works to start (Notepad, TextEdit) — a syntax-highlighting code editor makes learning noticeably easier and is covered in the Installation tab, but isn't required to write your very first page.

3. A web browser (required)

Chrome, Firefox, Edge, or Safari — any modern browser works for everything in this course. Having at least one browser's Developer Tools available (all major browsers ship this built in, free, no install) matters starting from the Fundamentals tab.

4. Comfort with the command line (helpful, not required)

Not needed to write or view a first HTML page at all — but becomes genuinely useful once this course reaches local dev servers (Intermediate tab) and any tooling beyond opening a file directly. The Installation tab covers a no-terminal path for as long as possible.

5. What you do *not* need yet

Quick self-check

Can you create a new folder on your computer, save a plain text file into it with a .html extension, and double-click that file to open it in your browser? If yes, you're ready to start at Fundamentals right now. If any part of that felt unclear, spend a few minutes on basic file management first — it's a five-minute gap to close, not a real prerequisite topic in itself.