A Guide to Effective Tagging

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A new method to promote and discover art has been released to the community in the form of Tags! When submitting art, adding relevant tags to your deviations will help viewers discover art of interest to them and give your work more exposure.

You can add tags based on a variety of things, be it subject matter, themes, medium used, fandom, or anything else you feel is important.

Use these tips to make the most of tags and help your art to find its audience:

  • Keep it simple. The less complicated the tag, the easier your art is to discover.

  • Be specific. If you take a picture of a rose, tagging it as #flower, while correct, won’t get your art as much attention as tagging it #rose will. You can, of course, tag both.

  • Tag efficiently. If your art is based on Lord of the Rings, tag it #LordOfTheRings and/or #lotr. You don’t need to tag every combination — tag the most commonly used.

  • Tag important things. While your art may include many aspects to it, your tags should focus on only the most important parts. If your artwork has one small hill far off in the background, you don’t need to tag it #hill.

  • Tag themes, genres, and ideas. Use tags for posts about events, concepts, and common genres! For example, you might tag a painting #scifi and #spacetravel in addition to #spaceship and #aliens.

  • Tag trends. If your art is about a current event or following a trend building on the internet, then use tags to include your art in the broad conversation. Or, start your own trend with your friends!

  • Build your audience. Artists working on an original series can make a tag specifically for that series, so viewers can find any and all art related to it with just one click.

  • One word tags. Tags are limited to one word without spaces. That way you can find already existing communities, and your art stands a better chance of being seen.

  • Use mentions. If you want a friend to see your artwork, @mention them in your Artist’s Comments, not in tags. It’s a faster, more efficient way to notify them.

  • Don’t tag your username. Our search engine will find your art just fine when someone searches your username, so use that tag space for something more efficient!

  • Tag resources. When using someone’s stock or resources in your work, tags are a good way to display whose resources you used. That said, be sure to adhere to the stock provider’s guidelines, when using their resources for your art.

  • Check your spelling. Typos in your tags means your art may not be discovered the way you want it to be. Use the autocomplete menu for tags, if you're not sure about how something is spelled!

Examples of Good and Bad Tags

Enterprise by aunjuli

Good Tags: #StarTrek #Enterprise #space #scifi #spacetravel #fanart #watercolor

Bad Tags: #StarWars #red #mlp #photo


screech by zilla774

Good Tags: #owl #screechowl #birds #birdsofprey #feathers #brown

Bad Tags: #hawk #drawing #bigbrownscreechowl


Noir by kozispoon

Good Tags: #detective #pistol #noir #gaiaonline #rohrschach 

Bad Tags: #color #chibi #toothpick #stripes


To read more about tags and their release on deviantART, check out the release article.

Comments276
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Flash-Art121's avatar

Can someone tell me how to add tags to my subscriptions ?


I can't find the link on the page ...