Emphasis, bold, italics. What if you needed to handle all three at once? (bogus method used for the preceding example ;-)

Here are three options (plus any additional scenarios you can think of). Note that the <strong> element could be swapped for the <em> element in these examples (the reverse), depending on what level of emphasis you were trying to convey.

The idea: choose <em> or <strong> to convey the correct level of emphasis, then apply the additional style that's desired, whether that be italics or bold.

Q: Which method would you choose for handling emphasis, bold, and italics -- at the same time?

1. <strong><em>Empholdics</em></strong>
2. <strong><i>Empholdics</i></strong>
3. <strong><span>Empholdics</span></strong>

   With:

   strong span {
  font-style: italic;
  }
4. <strong class="italic">Empholdics</strong>

   With:

   .italic {
  font-style: italic;
  }