Tables VS. <DIV>

Seems like the new web standard is to get rid of tables and use <DIV> tags. Does this really allow the spiders and crawlers to crawl your site more easily? Does it really improve you rankings?

I've slowly started moving from tables to <DIV>, but I'm just wondering if all the trouble is worth it.

Comments?

Generally speaking, using <div>s instead of <table>s generates less overall html code. Some spiders stop after a certain number of characters have been read (though not as much any more I don't think), so the less code the better. One of the biggest advantages (as far as spiders go) is that you can put the navigation <div> and main content <div> at the top of the source so the spiders are sure to read it, but you can position them wherever you want with CSS.

This general topic has been discussed several times, though not necessarily specifically related to search engines. » Other Threads «

use both... use tables for seriously tabular data but use <divs> + CSS for layouts

What Sexay Hamster said. Using <div> tags w/ CSS allow you to position your content where SE's can find it better. Take THIS site for example. The navigation is on the left, but if you look at the code, you will notice that the actual content is before the navigation in the code. Which allows for more keyword density and better SE placement...but thats a whole other thread all together.

One more thing that goes along with all of this that I forgot to mention. If you're really concerned about spiders, you can always create a different stylesheet for them, moving keyword-rich content to the top (but don't forget links are important too so it can move through your site), and even show/hide certain sections for spiders only. If you were to use tables for your layout, you'd have to make a new spider-specific page instead of a simple spider-specific stylesheet.