⚡ Standards

Web standards are a set of guidelines and specifications that define and describe various aspects of the World Wide Web.

Developed by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the Web Hypertext Application Technology Working Group (WHATWG), the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), and others, web standards ensure the consistent, interoperable, and accessible design and functionality of websites and web applications across different browsers, devices, and platforms.

According to our statistics, standards are used on 99.7% of all websites.
3.5% of these sites use only one standard, 24.4% use two, and 72.1% use three or more at the same time.

⭐ Most Popular in 2025

The following chart shows the leading standards on the web in 2025, based on market share.

The most popular is CSS with an impressive share of 95.9%, followed by HTML with 93.1% and Open Graph with 52.2%.

CSS 95.9%
HTML 93.1%
Open Graph 52.2%
RSD 34.5%
JSON 33.8%
DNS Prefetch 31.9%
Preconnect 22.1%
XFN 21.7%
Preload 18.2%
Pingback 16.2%
XHTML 5.9%
Speculation Rules 4.7%
Acceptable Ads 3.1%
YAML 1.8%
AMP 1.4%

You can also drill down by country:

Canada

🚀 Country Highlights

Here is a list of standards that are especially popular in certain countries.
Differences between global and country rankings are shown in parentheses.

HTML is #1 in Germany ^(-1)
RSD is #3 in Nigeria ^(-1)
JSON is #3 in Kenya ^(-2)
Preconnect is #3 in Cyprus ^(-4)
XHTML is #3 in Hong Kong ^(-8)
Acceptable Ads is #3 in the British Virgin Islands ^(-10)
DNS Prefetch is #4 in Japan ^(-2)
AMP is #5 in Cambodia ^(-10)
Preload is #6 in Austria ^(-3)
YAML is #9 in Canada ^(-5)

✨ Top Web Standards

Below is a more detailed list of the top 25 of the 52 standards we track, ranked by their market share.

Rank	Name	Market share
1	CSSCambridge, Massachusetts, United States A style language used to specify the presentation of HTML or XML documents, describing how elements should be displayed.	95.9%
2	HTMLCambridge, Massachusetts, United States A markup language used to create web pages, the de facto standard for documents displayed in a web browser.	93.1%
3	Open GraphMenlo Park, California, United States Enables any web page to become a rich object in a social graph.	52.2%
4	RSD An XML format that helps client software find the services needed to read, edit, or "work with" weblogging software.	34.5%
5	JSON A lightweight, language-independent data exchange format derived from JavaScript.	33.8%
6	DNS PrefetchCambridge, Massachusetts, United States The rel="dns-prefetch" attribute on HTML elements.	31.9%
7	PreconnectCambridge, Massachusetts, United States The rel="preconnect" attribute on HTML elements.	22.1%
8	XFN An HTML microformat that provides a simple way to represent human relationships using links.	21.7%
9	PreloadCambridge, Massachusetts, United States The rel="preload" attribute on HTML elements.	18.2%
10	Pingback A method for web authors to request notification when somebody links to one of their documents.	16.2%
11	XHTMLCambridge, Massachusetts, United States An XML-based markup language that extends HTML 4.	5.9%
12	Speculation RulesMountain View, California, United States API is used to improve navigation performance by prefetching or even prerendering future navigations.	4.7%
13	Acceptable AdsBerlin, Germany A set of criteria defined by the independent Acceptable Ads Committee that allows publishers to reach ad-blocking users with respectful, non-intrusive and relevant ads.	3.1%
14	YAML A data serialization language designed to be human friendly and work well with modern programming languages for common everyday tasks.	1.8%
15	AMPSan Francisco, California, United States An open source HTML framework for creating lightweight pages that are optimized for mobile web browsing and load faster.	1.4%
16	PrefetchCambridge, Massachusetts, United States The rel="prefetch" attribute on HTML elements.	1.3%
17	OAuthFremont, California, United States An open protocol to allow secure authorization in a simple and standard method from web, mobile and desktop applications.	1.2%
18	OpenSearchSeattle, Washington, United States Used to describe a search engine for a website so that a browser can use that search engine.	1%
19	IAB TCFBrussels, Belgium An open-source standard that helps companies comply with EU data privacy regulations when processing personal data.	1%
20	Trace ContextCambridge, Massachusetts, United States Defines standard HTTP headers and a value format for propagating context information that enables distributed tracing.	1%
21	CGI An interface specification that enables web servers to execute an external program to process HTTP requests.	0.8%
22	Sass A stylesheet language that compiles to CSS and allows developers to use variables, nested rules, mixins, and functions.	0.7%
23	OpenIDSan Ramon, California, United States A decentralized authentication protocol based on the OAuth 2.0.	0.5%
24	Less A backward-compatible CSS language extension inspired by Sass that supports variables, mixins, operations, and functions.	0.5%
25	GraphQLMenlo Park, California, United States A data query and manipulation language for APIs typically used for remote client-server communications.	0.5%

👉 See Also

🔗 Links
- Web standards

Data is based on the analysis of 2,564,428 websites.
Statistics were last calculated on October 31, 2025.
For details, see our methodology and disclaimer.