Text not allowed in element “ol” in this context.

Text content cannot be placed directly inside an ol element. All text within an ordered list must be wrapped in li elements.

The ol element accepts only li, script, and template elements as children. Any bare text node placed directly between <ol> and </ol> (or between </li> and <li>) is invalid. This includes whitespace-only text nodes in some edge cases, but the validator typically flags visible text content.

This error often appears when list items are missing their <li> tags, or when extra text (like a heading or description) is placed inside the ol instead of before or after it.

Invalid example

<ol>
  Some introductory text
  <li>First item</li>
  <li>Second item</li>
</ol>

Valid example

Move the text outside the ol, or wrap each piece of text in an li element:

<p>Some introductory text</p>
<ol>
  <li>First item</li>
  <li>Second item</li>
</ol>

Learn more:

MDN Reference

HTML ol element - MDN

→

WHATWG Spec

HTML lists - WHATWG

→

web.dev Article

Learn HTML: Lists

→