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Is there some recognized best practice when it comes to inserting hypertext in a page? For instance, what is the best between:

Check out our website: http://example.com

And..

Check out our website!

Or..

Check out our website!

I'm thinking the first one might be preferable for mails where links can't be clicked for some reason, but the other two look better. Also, cases likes those:

You can register on our website

You can register here

You can register on our website

You get the point. So is there some recognized style guide for this out there?

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The best way is to link to the word or phrase with a meaning, such as website or register. Never ever link the word here.

Reference: accepted answer on the question Why shouldn't we use words such as 'here' and 'this' in textlinks?

There's an overwhelming amount of evidence that website visitors don't read, they scan. They scan for links to find the link they want to click on next. If your link says "click here" and the user has to read the text around the link to find out what it is for, you are adding to their cognitive load, meaning they are less likely to continue on.

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As long as your links look like something that the user can click on (and if they aren't, you are doing something wrong), then things like "here" and "click here" are a complete waste of space.

The blockquote posted by Charles Boyung September 29, 2011

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    +1 I had a sign on my desk that read "Death to 'Click Here'". Yada yada yada... I was asked to remove it. ;) But I stand by the sentiment.
    – Tim FitzGerald
    Jul 10, 2014 at 13:06
  • You should always consider your userbase - if they are common users, you should provide nice phrases as Links. If they are more technical geeks you can give them the full URL sometimes, because they want to see it in many cases, or check it for phishing or something else...
    – Falco
    Jul 10, 2014 at 13:20
  • @Faloc if I want to see the URL to verify where it goes, I would be very stupid to trust what is displayed in the body of the webpage, even if that is formatted as a raw URL.
    – Taemyr
    Jul 10, 2014 at 14:23
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    Another reason to display the URL would be that you want to help them to remember it. For example, "You can always come back here by visiting www.example.com/this-page." Or, "Ask your friends to do x by visiting www.example.com." Naturally, your URLs need to be pretty straight forward in order for this to work.
    – jimchristie
    Jul 10, 2014 at 15:20
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Technical users will know to look at their browser's status field to see the URL, so you should still link phrases. Never link the URL, only use it in plain-text situations or where there is no better text to link.

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    Welcome to the site @aeh4rwerh! At the moment, your answer is rather brief and reads as just an opinion. You could strengthen it by citing standards or studies.
    – Graham Herrli
    Jul 10, 2014 at 14:29

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