HTML5 has been around for a couple of years now – slowly growing as more and more websites transition from HTML4; and more and more browsers start to fully support all of HTML5’s features. As of right now almost all devices out there fully support HTML5. Computer browsers such as Chrome, Opera and Firefox support HTML5. Mobile phone browsers such as iPhone’s Safari and even BlackBerry’s WebKit browser fully support HTML5.
As such it makes sense that W3C would set HTML5 to Recommendation status. For those of you confused by what this means – W3C publishes a variety of documents that define various Web technologies. These documents follow a specific process designed to promote fairness, consensus, public accountability, and quality. At the end of this process, W3C publishes Recommendations, which are essentially considered to be the Web standards that any webmaster, website designer, and web developer should be following.
Now while most modern devices and browsers support HTML5, plenty of people are unfortunately still stuck on Windows XP devices using out-dated versions of Internet Explorer – and sadly these people will not be able to experience the full benefits of HTML5. As such while the W3C might recommend the use of HTML5 right now – you may want to consider your website’s target audience first before switching your website over. Having a fully modern HTML5 website when your target audience is 80% Internet Explorer 7 users isn’t going to bode very well.