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dd – description of a term

<dd>description</dd>

The description, value or answer for a term dt in a dl description list. The browser indents it by 40 px from the left. One term can have several descriptions – several meanings of a word, for example.

Default display: display: block
End tag: can be omitted – the description is ended by another dt, dd or by the end of dl
Content: flow content
Where it can be used: dl (or a div in dl), after dt or another dd
DOM interface: HTMLElement

Attributes

Only global attributes.

Examples

A term with two meanings:

<dl>
  <dt>Loaf</dt>
  <dd>A round or oval bread.</dd>
  <dd>The amount of dough for one bread.</dd>
</dl>

result

Loaf: A round or oval bread.; The amount of dough for one bread.

Things to watch out for

The indent is margin-left: 40px (on the right in right-to-left text) – margin: 0 removes it.
It is not used outside dl, not even to indent text.

Browser support

Baseline – widely available: works in all major browsers and has for a long time (since 2015 at the latest). Since version: Chrome 1, Firefox 1, Safari 4. As of October 2026 (MDN browser-compat-data).