Google can't look at a picture the way a person does. It relies on surrounding text — and especially the image's alt text — to decide what an image is about and when to show it in search results.
How alt text helps your rankings
- Google Images traffic — well-described images can appear in image search and bring visitors.
- Page relevance — descriptive alt text reinforces what your page is about.
- Accessibility signals — accessible, high-quality pages tend to perform better overall.
- Linked images — when an image is a link, its alt text acts like the link's anchor text.
What about image titles and captions?
Titles show as a tooltip when someone hovers over an image, and captions are visible text under it. Captions are read by both visitors and search engines, so a short, natural caption adds context. Image titles have little direct SEO weight but improve the experience.
Common mistakes
- Leaving alt text empty on important images
- Using file names like
DSC_0012 - Stuffing keywords — Google treats this as spam
- Copying the same alt text onto every image
Automating it in WordPress
Most sites have hundreds of images with missing alt text. Alt-Text-Image-Meta scans your Media Library, analyses each image with AI, and fills in alt text, title, caption and description — so every image works for your SEO without hours of manual typing.