Using categories and tags, which one is better?

When I finally sat down to write this piece, the first analogy I thought of to help me explain categories was from a TV show. It was an episode of Gomer Pyle, USMC (c. mid-1960s). I wasn’t much of a fan of Gomer Pyle. But, I was stuck in the house with the flu this particular day.

The episode was the one where Gomer organises the supplies in the base exchange store into three categories: animal, vegetable, and mineral. While watching this episode, it hit me that I never before seriously thought about how to categorise things. BTW, I am not the first person to use Gomer Pyle’s supply store fiasco as an allegory for categorising things–pleasant surprise. Scope out Jeff Atwood’s piece on tree hierarchies.

“Categorization is extraordinarily difficult to do correctly unless
you’re an expert in the field. And even then, there is disagreement.”

~Jeff Atwood, co-founder of Stack Overflow.

Using categories and tags for your posts should have only one goal. Categories and tags should help your readers find something useful to them. Please don’t forget this.

What is a category?

According to WordPress.com, categories allow for a broad grouping of blog post topics. Tags did not exist in the first versions of WordPress. Tags were introduced (out of need) in WordPress 2.5. Can you guess why tags were needed? Read on for the answer.

What is a tag?

WordPress.com says that tags are similar to categories, but they generally are used to describe a post in more detail.

What’s the difference between a category and a tag?

WordPress had to build support for tagging because categories were getting out of control. People were using so many categories that they stopped being helpful. Here are the main differences:

Categories are hierarchical. Tags are not; tags are flat.
Categories are required in WordPresss. Tags are optional. Each post must have at least one category. Uncategorized is the default category.
Categories should be more static or stable than tags. I.e. Categories shouldn’t be volatile; they are more permanent. Tags will come and go. “Television” and “Sitcom” are examples for categories. “GomerPyle” and “TwinPeaks” are tag examples.

Is one better than the other? No. Categories and tags should work in concert to help you and your reader. Furthermore, I recommend only using just enough categories. Category bloat is high maintenance and diminishes returns. Same with tags. Using tags help people and search engines find relevant content. Too many tags will be filtered out by WordPress and be rejected by Instagram. More importantly, tags stuffing is considered spammy and totally unnecessary.

Example

For this photo recently published on Loop Images, list three possible categories and 15-20 tags.

Let’s compare notes.

Categories: Animals, Nature, Travel

Tags: Horse, Himalayas, Zhong, Monastery, Mountain, Meadow, Grazing, Finding inspiration, Rewilding, Trekking, Remote, High elevation, No people, Free range, Paro, Bhutan

Recommended reading

Categories vs. Tags, WordPresss.com
Categores vs Tags - SEO Best Practice for Sorting your Content, WPBeginner
How to Tag your Photos for Maximum Impact, EyeEm

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Using categories and tags