Headings are the outline, not the styling
The level says what a section contains, not how big the text is. Every heading problem worth fixing comes from confusing the two:
- Picking h3 because h2 looked too large — use CSS
- Marking a large piece of styled text as a heading because it is prominent
- Using h1 in a template for the logo, so every page starts at h2
What the checker flags
| Finding | Why it matters | | --- | --- | | No h1 | The page never states its subject in the one place expected to | | More than one h1 | Usually a template problem, occasionally an unfocused page | | Skipped level | A gap in the outline for anyone navigating by heading | | Starts below h1 | The first heading is a subsection of something absent |
Coming back up any number of levels is fine — h4 followed by h2 just ends a section.
Read the outline aloud
The fastest way to judge a page's structure is to read only its headings in order. If that reads as a coherent summary, the structure is sound. If it reads as a list of unrelated fragments, the problem is not the heading levels — it is that the page has no argument.
Questions
Is more than one h1 actually a problem?+
Less than it used to be. HTML5 permits it and search engines cope. But it usually indicates a real problem underneath — a template using h1 for the logo and again for the article, or a page genuinely trying to be about two things. The heading level is a symptom worth reading.
Does skipping a level matter?+
For search, barely. For a screen reader user navigating by heading, a jump from h2 to h4 is a missing rung on the ladder — they cannot tell whether content was skipped. It costs nothing to fix and it is a real accessibility defect.
Why does it need an account?+
Because it fetches the page from our server. Everything else on this site runs in your browser; these two tools cannot.
Does it see headings added by JavaScript?+
No. The page is fetched without running scripts, which is close to what many crawlers see. If your headings are missing here, that is worth knowing rather than working around.