Best way to link to external scripts in Document HEAD

Question

I've noticed many sites use this, without closing the tag.

 <script type="text/javascript" src="editor.js">

This style is also recommended but is longer:

 <script type="text/javascript" src="editor.js"></script>

Can I write it like this? Is it valid or is there a better way?

 <script type="text/javascript" src="editor.js" />

Answer 1

You always want to use

<script type="text/javascript" src="editor.js"></script>

Some browsers do not allow self-closing script tags.

For more information, see Why don't self-closing script tags work?

Answer 2

Use the second option. Not all browsers support the self-closing style.

Answer 3

<script type="text/javascript" src="editor.js">

This is invalid, and will break things.

<script type="text/javascript" src="editor.js"></script>

This is fine.

<script type="text/javascript" src="editor.js" />

This is fine so long as you are using XHTML that is not HTML Compatible. This means you need to serve the XHTML with an XML content-type (preferably application/xhtml+xml) and forget about supporting Internet Explorer (except with a separate document).