Label vs span : html

Span

The <span> tag is used to group inline-elements in a document.

The <span> tag provides no visual change by itself.

The <span> tag provides a way to add a hook to a part of a text or a part of a document.

Label

The <label> tag defines a label for an element.

The <label> element does not render as anything special for the user. However, it provides a usability improvement for mouse users, because if the user clicks on the text within the <label> element, it toggles the control.

The for attribute of the <label> tag should be equal to the id attribute of the related element to bind them together.

A label is used when you have a form or input elements - the label is associated with an input element. Span is a general container for any inline content. I think you want a span in this case

Every single person who "answered", simply copy-pasted documentation that describes the intended use-case. However, nobody explained the differences, or the WHY behind why you SHOULD use one or the other.

The reality is, either one will technically work, so it honestly does not even matter. You could use any number of other similar tags, including the <i> tag (properly styled with a class). Assign it a unique id, use document.getElementById(), or use nodes, etc, do what you want. The only people who care are semantic purists.

The label "can" and "should" be used with a form input element, true. But it is NOT TRUE that it CAN NOT or MUST NOT be used in any other way. Which means it CAN and COULD be used in other ways.

First of all, notice how <label> is simply used as a label "for an element". It does not say what TYPE of element. It does not say it must be an input element or a form element. Indeed, non-form elements can have controls associated with them for provide a user experience, which perhaps manipulate objects with CSS and so on, and a label may simply connect the text to any such things. The form could exist invisibly on page. Who knows.

Why might it be a bad idea to use a standalone label? If your document might exist for a long time, through several browser versions and HTML standards updates, the definition of <label> might change to more strictly enforce association with form input elements, then you might have a problem. But the same is true for just about any other aspect of any of a number of specifications we rely upon just to render a page.

It's probably a very rare scenario that such a change would occur, and you'd likely not even work at the same company or on the same project team, so in all honesty, who really cares except purists?

Well, maybe anyone who is visually impaired if they rely on some technology that treats a <label> different than <span>, which could confuse the technology or the user or both. I don't have any experience with such accessibility devices, but that might be a better reason WHY.

Another valid reason is <span> is shorter to type than <label>.

And another reason might be subtle differences in the way that a search engine ranks your page or references content if using <label> vs <span>. This is a bit of a stretch, because such algorithms are generally not publicly available, but it's possible. One engine might produce better results one way, another engine may prefer the other way, and another engine may not care either way.

All that said, without any further knowledge of context, I'd probably go with <span> as it seems the most generic and least contentious way of doing things. But I felt the question lacked a thorough answer, as answers usually involve a comprehension of why.