Qué es Alt Text?
Definición Rápida
El texto alternativo (alt text) es una descripción escrita de una imagen utilizada en sitios web, ayudando a los motores de búsqueda a entender las imágenes y mejorando la accesibilidad.
Alt text serves two critical purposes: web accessibility and SEO. For visually impaired users who rely on screen readers, alt text provides a verbal description of images they cannot see. For search engines that cannot "see" images either, alt text explains what an image depicts, helping it appear in image search results.
Writing good alt text is both an art and a science. It should be descriptive but concise (typically 125 characters or less), include relevant keywords naturally (not stuffed), and accurately describe what the image shows. Decorative images that don't convey information can have empty alt attributes (alt="") so screen readers skip them.
Alt text is also what displays when an image fails to load, giving users context about what they're missing. This fallback function makes it important for user experience even beyond accessibility and SEO.
For e-commerce sites, product image alt text is especially valuable — it helps product images appear in Google Image Search, which drives significant shopping traffic. Descriptive, keyword-rich alt text on product photos can be a meaningful source of organic traffic.
Por Qué es Importante
Alt text is one of the easiest SEO wins most websites overlook. Google Images drives billions of searches daily, and proper alt text is the primary way to get your images found. Beyond SEO, alt text is a legal accessibility requirement in many jurisdictions — websites that don't provide it may violate ADA compliance standards.
For content-heavy sites, adding descriptive alt text to every image creates hundreds of additional ranking opportunities without creating new content.
Ejemplos Reales
A food blog added descriptive alt text to 500 recipe photos and saw Google Images traffic increase by 40% within two months
An e-commerce store wrote unique alt text for 2,000 product images instead of using file names, leading to a 15% increase in organic product page visits
A real estate agency described each property photo with location, features, and room type, capturing searches like 'modern kitchen in Austin TX'
A nonprofit improved their website's WCAG compliance score from 62% to 94% simply by adding proper alt text to all images
Términos Relacionados
On-Page SEO
El SEO on-page implica optimizar páginas web individuales — contenido, código HTML y enlaces internos — para posicionarlas más alto en los motores de búsqueda.
Technical SEO
El SEO técnico es el proceso de optimizar la infraestructura de tu sitio web para que los motores de búsqueda puedan rastrear, indexar y renderizar tus páginas de forma eficiente.
SERP (Search Engine Results Page)
Una SERP es la página que muestra un motor de búsqueda en respuesta a una consulta, con resultados orgánicos, anuncios pagados, fragmentos destacados y otros tipos de contenido.
Meta Tags
Las meta etiquetas son fragmentos de código HTML que proporcionan información sobre una página web a los motores de búsqueda y usuarios, incluyendo título, descripción y palabras clave.
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