I’ve been diving into HTML and trying to wrap my head around how to properly structure documents, especially when it comes to headings. There’s so much conflicting information out there! Here’s the thing that’s been bugging me: is it really acceptable to skip certain heading levels when you’re structuring your documents? Like, can you go from an H1 straight to an H4 or something, or should it always be H1, H2, H3, and so on in that order?

I mean, I get that the hierarchy of headings helps with accessibility and SEO, but I can’t help but wonder if there’s room for flexibility. Sometimes, when I’m designing a layout or a page, I feel like you just need to skip a level to make the content flow better and look cleaner. Plus, I’ve seen other sites do it! But then I think, am I breaking some kind of rule? If I use H1 for the main title and then jump right to H4 for a sub-section, does it mess with the structure?

I’ve even read about people arguing for a more flexible approach, suggesting that as long as the semantics make sense, maybe it’s okay to mix things up a bit. But isn’t there a risk that users, especially those using screen readers, might get confused if the heading structure doesn’t follow a clear, logical order?

Then again, what if the content just doesn’t fit neatly into that H2-H3 hierarchy? Should I be rigid about following every guideline, or is there room to make this more about design and readability?

I’d love to hear what you all think about this. Have you run into this issue, and how do you handle it in your projects? Do you stick to the ‘rules’ or do you find yourself bending them for the sake of layout and aesthetics? Let’s hash this out!