HTML <rb>
The <rb> element designates the base text for ruby annotations in East Asian languages. It must be within <ruby> tags and is often paired with <rt> for pronunciation guides and <rp> for fallback rendering.
Note: The
<rb>tag is deprecated, meaning it’s no longer recommended for use in new projects. Instead, characters can be written directly within the<ruby>tags.
Syntax
<ruby><rb>Base text goes here</rb><rp>(</rp> <rt>Annotation text goes here</rt> <rp>)</rp></ruby>
Example
The example below showcases how the <rb> tag is used to transliterate the Chinese characters meaning 'I like to write code' inside a <ruby> element.
<ruby><rb>我</rb><rt>I</rt> <rb>喜欢</rb><rt>like</rt> <rb>写</rb><rt>to write</rt><rb>程序</rb><rt>code</rt></ruby>
This is what it looks like in the browser:
Another approach is to replace the English translations with Pinyin, which represents the Chinese characters using the Roman alphabet for pronunciation guidance. Here’s an example:
<ruby><rb>我</rb><rt>wǒ</rt> <rb>喜欢</rb><rt>xǐ huān</rt> <rb>写</rb><rt>xiě</rt><rb>程序</rb><rt>chéng xù</rt></ruby>
Running this code will display the following:
Contribute to Docs
- Learn more about how to get involved.
- Edit this page on GitHub to fix an error or make an improvement.
- Submit feedback to let us know how we can improve Docs.
Learn HTML on Codecademy
- Front-end engineers work closely with designers to make websites beautiful, functional, and fast.
- Includes 34 Courses
- With Professional Certification
- Beginner Friendly.115 hours
- Start at the beginning by learning HTML basics — an important foundation for building and editing web pages.
- Beginner Friendly.7 hours