Mobile browsing is one of the latest big focuses for Google and other search engines. This interest has given rise to the development of the Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) Project, which is a mobile content distribution initiative intended to optimize mobile webpages for users.
There are some aspects of AMP pages that you should keep in mind.
As AMP reads content faster, it needs more context regarding how the page is created. AMP includes AMP JS, AMP HTML, and Google AMP Cache.
AMP HTML is comprised of custom tags and properties along with several restrictions. This version of AMP is different from regular HTML, making it necessary to use the former if you want Google to display your pages on mobile searches.
AMP JS is the JavaScript version, and the AMP Cache is the optional content delivery network. Both can enable the AMP-enabled webpages to load faster on mobile devices.
As stated, if you want Google to show your website when people perform mobile searches, you need to create AMP versions of your pages.
An example of this would be <link rel=”amphtml” href=”http://www.[yourwebsite].com/etc>, serving as a canonical tag.
However, you should remember that the two versions of the page are entirely different. For instance, specific JavaScript elements such as on-page comments and forms won't appear on the AMP page. The AMP page is a simplified version of the original.
Since mobile pages are supposed to load faster, the AMP Project also includes specific elements such as simpler fonts (custom fonts must use an amp-font extension to appear on mobile versions), amp-img for images, amp-video for videos, and amp-anim for animated GIFs.
While you can have AMP pages alone, and don't require those at all, either, you can maximize your exposure on search engines with both AMP and non-AMP versions of pages. Using AMP pages can help mobile users find you on the go, while your default pages can reach people at home or work.