Different ways to display title

The second form can be handy too:

• We can also use the third parameter:

  the_title( $before, $after, $echo ); 
  

  to assign the title to a variable.

  Here’s an example:

  $title = the_title( '<h1 class="entry-title">', '</h1>', false );
  

• This can also help reducing the use of <?php ?> delimiters.

  Here’s an example from the Twenty Fifteen theme

   if ( is_single() ) :
       the_title( '<h1 class="entry-title">', '</h1>' );
   else :
       the_title( sprintf( '<h2 class="entry-title"><a href="https://wordpress.stackexchange.com/questions/239292/%s" rel="bookmark">', esc_url( get_permalink() ) ), '</a></h2>' );
   endif;
  

  but there are of course various ways to get rid of such if/else parts.

  Here’s an alternative form for comparison:

  <?php if( is_single() ) : ?>
      <h1 class="entry-title"><?php the_title(); ?></h1>
  <?php else : ?>
      <h2 class="entry-title"><a href="https://wordpress.stackexchange.com/questions/239292/<?php the_permalink(); ?>" rel="bookmark"><?php the_title(); ?></a></h2>
  <?php endif; ?>