WHATWG

WHATWG, short for Web Hypertext Application Technology Working Group, is a community of web developers and vendors dedicated to evolving the core web platform through living standards. It was formed in 2004 by members of the browser and web-application communities in response to disagreements over HTML evolution and closed versioning. Rather than producing static specifications, WHATWG publishes Living Standards that are continuously updated to reflect current browser behavior and user needs. The group's most prominent product is the HTML Living Standard, a specification describing the standard for HTML as used on the Web today. WHATWG also maintains living standards for related technologies such as the DOM (Document Object Model), URL, Fetch, Streams, and Encoding.

WHATWG operates with a collaborative, open process. Anyone can contribute, and decisions are made through consensus among participants from browser vendors, web applications developers, and other stakeholders. The organization coordinates with the W3C, which sources its HTML work from WHATWG's living standard; the two organizations maintain a cooperative relationship intended to harmonize direction while preserving WHATWG's living-standard approach.

Historically, WHATWG emerged to address perceived stagnation in HTML development; its work has since become central to modern web compatibility, with major browsers implementing features described in the HTML Living Standard. The WHATWG site and public GitHub repositories host the evolving standards, test suites, and reference materials that guide browser development and web application design.