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The , or description list, element is underrated. It’s used to represent a list of name–value pairs. This is a common UI pattern that, at the same time, is incredibly versatile. For instance, you’ve probably seen these layouts out in the wild… Each of these examples shows a list (or lists!) of name–value pairs. You might have also seen lists of name–value pairs to describe lodging amenities, or to list out individual charges in your monthly rent, or in glossaries of technical terms. Each of these is a candidate to be represented with the element. I’ve been saying “ ,” when really, I’m talking about three separate elements: , , and . We start with our . This is the description list,[note 1] akin to using a for an unordered list or an for an ordered list. Next up, we want to add a name–value pair. We’ll use a , short for description term, for the name, and we’ll use a , short for description detail, for the value.[note 2] Title Designing with Web Standards To add another name–value pair to our list, we add another and : Title Designing with Web Standards Publisher New Riders Pub; 3rd edition (October 19, 2009) But wait — what if I have a term that has multiple values? For instance, what if this book has multiple authors? That’s fine! One can have multiple s: Title Designing with Web Standards Author Jeffrey Zeldman Ethan Marcotte Publisher New Riders Pub; 3rd edition (October 19, 2009) There’s one last piece of the description list anatomy to look at for most basic use cases: what if I want to wrap a and its (s) for styling reasons? In this case, the specs allow you to wrap a and its (s) in a : Title Designing with Web Standards Author Jeffrey Zeldman Ethan Marcotte Publisher New Riders Pub; 3rd edition (October 19, 2009) A wrapper like this is the only element that can wrap those / groups. And that’s it! That’s the anatomy of the description list, HTML's semantic way to mark up a list of name–value groups! Before we learned about the , , and elements, my team used to use nested s for this pattern all the time. It looked a lot like: Title Designing with Web Standards Author Jeffrey Zeldman Ethan Marcotte Publisher New Riders Pub; 3rd edition (October 19, 2009) This has all the information about the book, right? Why do we need semantics for a list of name–value groups in the first place if something like a series of nested s could get the job done? When determining whether a semantic element might be appropriate for a given pattern, I find it helpful to ask, “What benefits — even theoretical — could we get if computers could recognize this pattern?” In this case, what lift could we get if browsers could somehow recognize a list of name–value groups? Answers to that question will be varied. I tend to spend a lot of time advocating for web accessibility, so my first thought tends to be how screenreaders could interpret the pattern. Off the top of my head, I can think of a couple of benefits screenreader users could get from their screenreaders recognizing this pattern: All of these could make the list more usable than a series of nested s, which would treat each name and value in the list as nothing more than a standalone text node. If you can come up with a couple of even theoretical lifts from the user’s device recognizing a pattern, then there’s a good chance that the pattern is a strong candidate for having some associated semantics. For what it’s worth, these screenreader experiences aren’t hypothetical — they’re benefits that screenreader users really get from using in most browser/screenreader combinations. Admittedly, however, support for the element is not yet universal. You may decide that screenreaders’ fallback experience — treating the list as standalone text nodes — isn’t sufficient for your use case, and instead opt for something like a until support improves. My favorite example, the one that really takes the cake for me, is Dungeons & Dragons statblocks, which are really “Oops! All Name–Value Pairs!” No, really: just how many candidates for s do you see in this statblock alone? I counted five possible description lists, personally. Here’s

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