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Asked: 2026-06-05T09:42:27+00:00

I’ve always wondered whether whitespace before a DOCTYPE matters, but I can’t seem to

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I’ve always wondered whether whitespace before a DOCTYPE matters, but I can’t seem to find any definitive information on the web. People say not to do it, but I can’t see what effect it’s likely to have, or even if the spec says it must be like that. I can’t figure out if it triggers compatibility mode in IE or anything annoying like that.

The reason is, in my (crappy asp.net) code, I would much prefer to write:

<%@ Page language="c#" Codepage="65001" AutoEventWireup="true" %>
<%@ OutputCache Location="None" VaryByParam="none" %>
<!doctype html>

than:

<%@ Page language="c#" Codepage="65001" AutoEventWireup="true" %><%@ OutputCache Location="None" VaryByParam="none" %><!doctype html>

Because the first is neater. But the result of the top one is a few blank lines in your rendered html.

Not a huge issue. I’ve just always wondered if it matters 🙂

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    Yes! comments and spaces may come first.

    Here’s the relevant section from the official HTML Specification

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