Skip to content
    Moz logo Menu open Menu close
    • Products
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Pro Home
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Home
      • STAT
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Home
      • Compare SEO Products
      • Moz Data
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis
      • Keyword Explorer
      • Link Explorer
      • Competitive Research
      • MozBar
      • More Free SEO Tools
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO
      • SEO Learning Center
      • Moz Academy
      • SEO Q&A
      • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Agency Solutions
      • Enterprise Solutions
      • Small Business Solutions
      • Case Studies
      • The Moz Story
      • New Releases
    • Log in
    • Log out
    • Products
      • Moz Pro

        Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

      • Moz Local

        Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

      • STAT

        SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

      • Moz API

        Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

      • Compare SEO Products

        See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

      • Moz Data

        Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
      Moz Pro

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

      Learn more
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis

        Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

      • Keyword Explorer

        Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

      • Link Explorer

        Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

      • Competitive Research

        Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

      • MozBar

        See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

      • More Free SEO Tools

        Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
      Moz Pro

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

      Learn more
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO

        The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

      • SEO Learning Center

        Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

      • On-Demand Webinars

        Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

      • How-To Guides

        Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

      • Moz Academy

        Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

      • MozCon

        Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
      Moz API

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

      Find your plan
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Small Business Solutions

        Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

      • Agency Solutions

        Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

      • Enterprise Solutions

        Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

      • The Moz Story

        Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

      • Case Studies

        Explore how Moz drives ROI with a proven track record of success.

      • New Releases

        Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

      Surface actionable competitive intel
      New Feature

      Surface actionable competitive intel

      Learn More
    • Log in
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Dashboard
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Dashboard
      • Moz Academy
    • Avatar
      • Moz Home
      • Notifications
      • Account & Billing
      • Manage Users
      • Community Profile
      • My Q&A
      • My Videos
      • Log Out

    The Moz Q&A Forum

    • Forum
    • Questions
    • Users
    • Ask the Community

    Welcome to the Q&A Forum

    Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

    1. Home
    2. SEO Tactics
    3. Intermediate & Advanced SEO
    4. Is this link follow or nofollow? Does it pass linkjuice?

    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.

    Is this link follow or nofollow? Does it pass linkjuice?

    Intermediate & Advanced SEO
    3
    7
    1224
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as question
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
    • TLM
      TLM last edited by

      I have been seeing conflicting opinions about how Google would treat links using 'onclick'.

      For the example provided below: Would Google follow this link and pass the appropriate linking metrics(it is internal and points to a deeper level in our visnav)?

      =-=-=-=-=-=-=

      <div id='<a class="attribute-value">navBoxContainer</a>' class="<a class="attribute-value">textClass</a>">
      

      <div id="<a class="attribute-value">boxTitle</a>" onclick="<a class="attribute-value">location.href='bla</a>h.example.com">

      <div class="<a class="attribute-value">boxTitleContent</a>" title="<a class="attribute-value">Text Here</a>"><a href<a class="attribute-value">Text Here</a>"><a ="blah.exam.cpleom">Text Herea>div>
      ```
      
       =-=-=-=-=-=-=
      
      An simple yes/no would be alright, but any detail/explination you could provide would be helpful and very much appreciated.
      
      Thank you all for your time and responses.
      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • David-Kley
        David-Kley last edited by

        Since the onclick event is a Javascript issue it's to all intents and purposes ignored by the search engines. What counts is whether or not your link appears in the href attribute, and whether or not the link is nofollowed. If you do not have it set to nofollow, there is a slight chance they would follow it, but as stated above, Google is pretty good about parsing javascript links.

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • TLM
          TLM last edited by

          I didn't know that marking a Good Answer would mark the thread as Answered.

          Still looking for responses; hope the 'Answered' tag doesn't cause too many people to pass the topic over.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • jesse-landry
            jesse-landry @TLM last edited by

            Fair enough! If there are conflicting opinions, I'll be surprised. Google has said since about 2008 or 09 that they are parsing Javascript functionality. Something about creating virtual link structures for spiders, blah blah but that's irrelevant really.

            Anyway, good luck!

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • TLM
              TLM @jesse-landry last edited by

              Yes, the code isn't posted here 'as-is'.

              I appreciate the quick response and the explination. I will wait for some other voices to chime in with their thoughts but I suspect they will mirror yours (although I am very interested in conflicting opinions if they are out there).

              jesse-landry 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • jesse-landry
                jesse-landry last edited by

                Well I'm assuming this code is modified and isn't live anywhere as it's kind of a mess and I don't mean formatting-wise. That said, clearly your question is mainly on the div onClick functionality and whether or not that passes link juice.

                To my knowledge, so long as the href is in place you will be fine. Google parses Javascript functionality pretty well and this is one of the simpler JS functions around.

                So my answer is: yes.

                TLM 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                • TLM
                  TLM last edited by

                  Tabbing seems to have scrunched the code, maybe this is easier to read

                  <div id='<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank">navBoxContainer</a>' class="<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank">textClass</a>">

                  <div id="<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank">boxTitle</a>" onclick="<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank">location.href='bla</a>h.example.com">

                  <div class="<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank">boxTitleContent</a>" title="<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Text Here</a>"><a href<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Text Here</a>"><a ="blah.exam.cpleom">Text Herea>div>

                  Hope that helps.

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • 1 / 1
                  • First post
                    Last post

                  Got a burning SEO question?

                  Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


                  Start my free trial


                  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.

                  • See all categories

                  Related Questions

                  • vmotuz

                    Follow or nofollow to subdomain

                    Hi, I run a hotel booking site and the booking engine is setup on a subdomain.
                     The subdomain is disabled from being indexed in robots.txt Should the links from the main domain have a nofollow to the subdomain? What are you thoughts? Thanks!

                    Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | vmotuz
                    0
                  • sbrault74

                    Google Indexing Feedburner Links???

                    I just noticed that for lots of the articles on my website, there are two results in Google's index. For instance: http://www.thewebhostinghero.com/articles/tools-for-creating-wordpress-plugins.html and http://www.thewebhostinghero.com/articles/tools-for-creating-wordpress-plugins.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+thewebhostinghero+(TheWebHostingHero.com) Now my Feedburner feed is set to "noindex" and it's always been that way. The canonical tag on the webpage is set to: rel='canonical' href='http://www.thewebhostinghero.com/articles/tools-for-creating-wordpress-plugins.html' /> The robots tag is set to: name="robots" content="index,follow,noodp" /> I found out that there are scrapper sites that are linking to my content using the Feedburner link. So should the robots tag be set to "noindex" when the requested URL is different from the canonical URL? If so, is there an easy way to do this in Wordpress?

                    Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | sbrault74
                    0
                  • simon_realbuzz

                    Should I 'nofollow' links between my own sites?

                    We have five sites which are largely unrelated but for cross-promotional purpose our company wishes to cross link between all our sites, possibly in the footer. I have warned about potential consequences of cross-linking in this way and certainly don't want our sites to be viewed as some sort of 'link ring' if they all link to one another. Just wondering if linking between sites you own really is that much of an issue and whether we should  'nofollow' the links in order to prevent being slapped with any sort of penalty for cross-linking.

                    Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | simon_realbuzz
                    0
                  • Ouzan

                    Noindex, Nofollow to previous domain

                    Hi, My programmer recently did a horrible mistkae by adding noindex, nofollow to our website without me noticing for two days. At the same time he did it we bought a new domain and redirected the old domain to the new domain: The Old domain is: http://www.websitebuildersworld.com and the new one is: http://www.websiteplanet.com Now unfortunatly I didn't notice the noindex,nofollow when it was on the old domain and I redirected it to websiteplanet.com before I fixed the noindex, nofollow. I fixed the problem around 10 hours ago on the new domain (www.websiteplanet.com) but the old domain didn't get indexed back (yet), so for example if you search for WebsiteBuildersWorld in google you will not reach the homepage as google deleted it because of the noindex,nofollow. My question is:
                    Do you think that it will be fixed and google will retrieve websitebuildersworld homepage to his search results and then redirect it to websiteplanet? Or because I redirected websitebuildersworld.com to websiteplanet.com before letting google crawling websitebuildersworld.com without the noindex,no follow it wouldn't get indexed again? I hope I explained the problem good enough. Looking forward for your valuable replies. Thanks.

                    Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Ouzan
                    0
                  • ScottBaxterWW

                    De-indexed Link Directory

                    Howdy Guys, I'm currently working through our 4th reconsideration request and just have a couple of questions. Using Link Detox (www.linkresearchtools.com) new tool they have flagged up a 64 links that are Toxic and should be removed. After analysing them further alot / most of them are link directories that have now been de-indexed by Google. Do you think we should still ask for them to be removed or is this a pointless exercise as the links has already been removed because its been de-indexed. Would like your views on this guys.

                    Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ScottBaxterWW
                    0
                  • jlane9

                    100 + links on a scrolling page

                    Can you add more than 100 links on your webpage If you have a webpage that adds more content from a database as a visitor scrolls down the page. If you look at the page source the 100 + links do not show up, only the first 20 links. As you scroll down it adds more content and links to the bottom of the page so its a continuos flowing page if you keep scrolling down. Just wanted to know how the 100 links maximum fits into this scenario ?

                    Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jlane9
                    0
                  • Paul78

                    Maximum number of links

                    Hi there, I have just written an article that is due to be posted on an external blog, the article has potentially 3 links that could link to 3 different pages on my website, is this too much? what do you recommend being the maximum number of links? Thanks for any help

                    Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Paul78
                    0
                  • CommercePundit

                    How Google treat internal links with rel="nofollow"?

                    Today, I was reading about NoFollow on Wikipedia. Following statement is over my head and not able to understand with proper manner. "Google states that their engine takes "nofollow" literally and does not "follow" the link at all. However, experiments conducted by SEOs show conflicting results. These studies reveal that Google does follow the link, but does not index the linked-to page, unless it was in Google's index already for other reasons (such as other, non-nofollow links that point to the page)." It's all about indexing and ranking for specific keywords for hyperlink text during external links. I aware about that section. It may not generate in relevant result during any keyword on Google web search. But, what about internal links? I have defined rel="nofollow" attribute on too many internal links. I have archive blog post of Randfish with same subject. I read following question over there. Q. Does Google recommend the use of nofollow internally as a positive method for controlling the flow of internal link love? [In 2007] A: Yes – webmasters can feel free to use nofollow internally to help tell Googlebot which pages they want to receive link juice from other pages
                    _
                    (Matt's precise words were: The nofollow attribute is just a mechanism that gives webmasters the ability to modify PageRank flow at link-level granularity. Plenty of other mechanisms would also work (e.g. a link through a page that is robot.txt'ed out), but nofollow on individual links is simpler for some folks to use. There's no stigma to using nofollow, even on your own internal links; for Google, nofollow'ed links are dropped out of our link graph; we don't even use such links for discovery. By the way, the nofollow meta tag does that same thing, but at a page level.) Matt has given excellent answer on following question. [In 2011] Q: Should internal links use rel="nofollow"?  A:Matt said: "I don't know how to make it more concrete than that." I use nofollow for each internal link that points to an internal page that has the meta name="robots" content="noindex" tag. Why should I waste Googlebot's ressources and those of my server if in the end the target must not be indexed? As far as I can say and since years, this does not cause any problems at all. For internal page anchors (links with the hash mark in front like "#top", the answer is "no", of course. I am still using nofollow attributes on my website. So, what is current trend? Will it require to use nofollow attribute for internal pages?

                    Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CommercePundit
                    0

                  Get started with Moz Pro!

                  Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

                  Start my free trial
                  Products
                  • Moz Pro
                  • Moz Local
                  • Moz API
                  • Moz Data
                  • STAT
                  • Product Updates
                  Moz Solutions
                  • SMB Solutions
                  • Agency Solutions
                  • Enterprise Solutions
                  Free SEO Tools
                  • Domain Authority Checker
                  • Link Explorer
                  • Keyword Explorer
                  • Competitive Research
                  • Brand Authority Checker
                  • Local Citation Checker
                  • MozBar Extension
                  • MozCast
                  Resources
                  • Blog
                  • SEO Learning Center
                  • Help Hub
                  • Beginner's Guide to SEO
                  • How-to Guides
                  • Moz Academy
                  • API Docs
                  About Moz
                  • About
                  • Team
                  • Careers
                  • Contact
                  Why Moz
                  • Case Studies
                  • Testimonials
                  Get Involved
                  • Become an Affiliate
                  • MozCon
                  • Webinars
                  • Practical Marketer Series
                  • MozPod
                  Connect with us

                  Contact the Help team

                  Join our newsletter
                  Moz logo
                  © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
                  • Accessibility
                  • Terms of Use
                  • Privacy

                  Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.