Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Yoast SEO Plugin: To Index or Not to index Categories?
-
Taking a poll out there......In most cases would you want to index or NOT index your category pages using the Yoast SEO plugin?
-
Thanks Dave!
Here are my settings:
Categories - noindex, follow
Tags - noindex, follow
Format - noindex, follow
Author Archives - noindex, follow and disable author archives
Date Archives - noindex, follow and disable the date-based archives
Media - noindex, follow
-
HI Irving,
The Yoast default doesn't have anything checked making everything indexable and their tutorials don't do a very good job at helping people set it up correctly.
It's interesting to know all the differing opinions on what you should have indexed or not indexed.
Here are the settings I have:
Categories - noindex, follow
Tags - noindex, follow
Format - noindex, follow
Author Archives - noindex, follow and disable author archives
Date Archives - noindex, follow and disable the date-based archives
Media - noindex, follow
-
Noindex is the way to go for category pages. I also don't let G index tags and archives.
-
yes noindex,follow category and tag pages. It's the Yoast default setting i believe.

Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Should I disable the indexing of tags in Wordpress?
Hi, I have a client that is publishing 7 or 8 news articles and posts each month. I am optimising selected posts and I have found that they have been adding a lot of tags (almost like using hashtags) . There are currently 29 posts but already 55 tags, each of which has its own archive page, and all of which are added to the site map to be indexed (https://sykeshome.europe.sykes.com/sitemap_index.xml). I came across an article (https://crunchify.com/better-dont-use-wordpress-tags/) that suggested that tags add no value to SEO ranking, and as a consequence Wordpress tags should not be indexed or included in the sitemap. I haven't been able to find much more reliable information on this topic, so my question is - should I get rid of the tags from this website and make the focus pages, posts and categories (redirecting existing tag pages back to the site home page)? It is a relatively new websites and I am conscious of the fact that category and tag archive pages already substantially outnumber actual content pages (posts and news) - I guess this isn't optimal. I'd appreciate any advice. Thanks wMfojBf
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | JCN-SBWD0 -
My url disappeared from Google but Search Console shows indexed. This url has been indexed for more than a year. Please help!
Super weird problem that I can't solve for last 5 hours. One of my urls: https://www.dcacar.com/lax-car-service.html Has been indexed for more than a year and also has an AMP version, few hours ago I realized that it had disappeared from serps. We were ranking on page 1 for several key terms. When I perform a search "site:dcacar.com " the url is no where to be found on all 5 pages. But when I check my Google Console it shows as indexed I requested to index again but nothing changed. All other 50 or so urls are not effected at all, this is the only url that has gone missing can someone solve this mystery for me please. Thanks a lot in advance.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Davit19850 -
How does Yoast SEO premium determine prominent keywords?
We are perplexed how Yoast determines which keywords to select on the page when ranking the top 5 prominent words in Insights. For example, we have a page where birthday parties is clearly the primary keyword. It is used an an H2, in body copy and tagged on images. Yet it does not show up at all. The term 20 Fiesta game points ranks #1. It is mentioned one time on the page in a bullet within one of 5-6 blocks. 40 Fiesta game points ranks 3rd and same situation. Waterpark ranks 4th and is mentioned twice on the page as a bullet of featured activities. But there ar 4-5 other attractions listed in the bullets higher? We have looked as tutorial videos and no one mentions how Yoast determines prominent keywords. Thanks in advance for steering us in the right direction.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Teamzig0 -
Google does not want to index my page
I have a site that is hundreds of page indexed on Google. But there is a page that I put in the footer section that Google seems does not like and are not indexing that page. I've tried submitting it to their index through google webmaster and it will appear on Google index but then after a few days it's gone again. Before that page had canonical meta to another page, but it is removed now.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | odihost0 -
Category Pages & Content
Hi Does anyone have any great examples of an ecommerce site which has great content on category pages or product listing pages? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BeckyKey1 -
SEO site Review
Does anyone have suggestions on places that provide in depth site / analytics reviews for SEO?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Gordian0 -
Domain expiration and seo
My domain name is free with my service with yahoo but it expires every year and gets extended automatically as I continue service, how does this impact my seo efforts? I've heard that the search engines prefer sites to expire in 3 years or more? Is this a fact?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | bronxpad0 -
SEO from Godaddy How Good is it?
http://www.godaddy.com/search-engine/seo-services.aspx?ci=44163 it said "Includes Standard Search Engine Visibility to Improve Search Rankings" it begs for question... Search Engine Visibility??? Improve SERP?!?!!? is it really that good? O.o; or have i successfully been eaten my promotional messages? Can anyone with experience with them share some information with me ? 🙂 (The price tag is mighty interesting)
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | IKT0