Q: Why should span be used instead of plain text? When my text does not have any special css nor does it need to be modified by JavaScript, is there any point (excluding meaningless standards) of using <span> instead of just typing the text in? e.g.
<body>
   <span>Text</span>
</body>

vs
<body>
   Text
</body>


A: It shouldn't.
As steveax suggests, MDN reference

The HTML  element is a generic inline container for phrasing content, which does not inherently represent anything. It can be used to group elements for styling purposes (using the class or id attributes), or because they share attribute values, such as lang. It should be used only when no other semantic element is appropriate.  is very much like a  element, but  is a block-level element whereas a  is an inline element.


A: If there are no styles on the <span>, and there generally aren't, it doesn't really make much of a difference.   Even the W3C says that <span> doesn't mean anything on its own.
It was created for applying styles to generic text (much like the <div>).
You didn't ask, but the difference between <div> and <span> is that the former is for grouping elements whereas the latter is for grouping text -- again with no semantics.  It is better to use semantic elements when it is appropriate.
The only possible advantage of adding the span there is if you needed to make a change to that specific text's style later.
