HTML tags are used to define elements on a web page and are surrounded by angle brackets. There are two types of tags: paired tags which have an opening and closing tag, and unpaired tags which are self-closing. Common tags include images (<img>), lists (ordered and unordered), tables (<table>), and forms. Forms allow users to enter data through different input fields like text, password, submit buttons and collect the data through actions. Attributes specify additional information about tags like the image source, form submission method, and required/disabled fields.