Do we need rel="prev" and rel="next" if we have a rel="canonical" for the first page of a series
-
Despite having a canonical on page 1 of a series of paginated pages for different topics, Google is indexing several, sometimes many pages in each topic. This is showing up as duplicate page title issues in Moz and Screaming Frog.
Ideally Google would only index the first page in the series. Do we need to use rel="prev" etc rather than a canonical on page 1? How can we make sure Google crawls but doesn't index the rest of the series?
-
So for the pages, would it look like:
Blog page 1 "rel next"
Blog page 2 "rel prev" & "rel next"
and so on?
-
Having the markup only prevents them from dinging you for dupes, not necessarily from indexing.
-
Thanks, super helpful! The canonical is only on the first page of the series but clearly we still need rel prev/next. Although I've noticed, from other sites that are using rel prev/next correctly that Google sometimes ignore that too and index a random selection of paginated pages.
-
Hello Hjsand,
My experience is yes you should be using rel="next" and rel="prev" for paginated pages.
Here is a guide that can help you understand why and how to implement these guidelines
https://moz.com/blog/seo-guide-to-google-webmaster-recommendations-for-pagination
Thanks,
-
Hi,
Google says they'll index paginated series properly and that they can usually interpret what the structure you've set, but as you're seeing, this is not always the case. The preferred method for pagination markup is to use rel prev/next, not to canonicalize the pages to the first or root version URL. The only place a canonical tag should live in a paginated series is on page=1 that points to the root URL.
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 noindex user-created fundraising pages?
Hello Moz community! I work for a nonprofit where users are able to create their own fundraising pages on the website for supporters to directly donate. Some of them are rarely used, others get updated frequently by the host. There are likely a ton of these on our site. Moz crawl says we have ~54K pages, and when I do a "site:[url]" search on Google, 90% of the first 100 results are fundraising pages. These are not controlled by our staff members, but I'm wondering if meta noindexing these pages could have a big effect on our SEO rankings. Has anyone tried anything similar or know if this strategy could have legs for our site? My only concern is whether users wouldn't be able to find their fundraising page in our Google CSE implemented on the website. Any insight you fine folks could provide would be greatly appreciated!
Moz Pro | | Adam_Paris1 -
Why does moz give different page authority to the same page if a visit comes from adwords vs organic search?
When clicking on an adwords ad the page the landing page has a page authority of 26. When clicking on organic search to the same exact landing page the page authority is 37. Why is this. Does moz or, more importantly Google see these as the same or separate pages? Thanks Tom
Moz Pro | | ffctas1 -
Yahoo Store Beginner with "duplicate content" errors. Can I pay for support? $$$
Hi. I have a Yahoo store that seems to have many errors. We built the site for utility knowing NOTHING about SEO. We just started with MOZ and would love to PAY someone to help get us past the beginning stages. Is there someone familiar with the Yahoo! Store format that can charge us perhaps in hourly blocks to walk us through possible solutions to issues? One issue we are having... seems to be that our subsections which contain items that are the endpoints... I know of no way to label the sections anything but an "item". I'm wondering if this might be causing the "duplicate" error because a specific item is listed both in the section and on it's own page. please help! Thom 888-567-5194
Moz Pro | | TITOJAX0 -
On-page grader question
Hi there, Getting to know the Pro tools and can't find an answer to this. Can someone explain for me please? Using on page grader, I found a couple pages with an F. I scrolled downWTO where it shows the keyword phrases and under each, the URL. Clicking on the first keyword "Building site alarms"it tells me off essentially for not optimising the page for that term. The URL is "construction site security systems" which are different to building site alarms which also have their own page. I don't understand why is Moz associating this keyword with this page? I certainly haven't told it to. Please he
Moz Pro | | DaddySmurf0 -
No page reports for one of my campaigns
Hi Everyone! so glad to be here, I had hardly visited the forum and been missing out. I have a client who hired me to set up their basic SEO for their website and I see no grades for the pages, at first I don't maybe the website was not being indexed but report shows it crawled 37 pages so what does it mean no grades what so ever, also showing now rankings, I put 30 to check and zilch. thank you.
Moz Pro | | FeuzaReis120 -
Canonical URLs and Duplicate Page Content
My website (doctor directory) is getting a lot of duplicate page content & duplicate page title warnings from SEOmoz. The pages that are getting the warnings are doctors profiles which can be accessed at three different URLs. Problem is this should be handled by the canonical tag on the pages. So example below, all three open the same page: https://www.arzttermine.de/arzt/dr-sara-danesh/ https://www.arzttermine.de/arzt/dr-sara-danesh/gkv https://www.arzttermine.de/arzt/dr-sara-danesh/pkv Here's our canonical tag (on line 34): rel="canonical" href="http://www.arzttermine.de/arzt/dr-sara-danesh" /> So why is SEO moz crawling the page? We are getting hundreds of errors from this - and yet Google doesn't have any of the duplicate URLs indexed...
Moz Pro | | thomashillard0 -
Page Penalization
Hiya, Looking for some advice, i have a page which the on page optimization tool shows as an A grade and Google has indexed it. I have checked vie site: however is not being found in search results even for an exact match on the page title which is very specific. I believe the page may be being penlized for over optimisation? any advice would be great! URL is www.tots-away.com/child-friendly-holidays-spain/
Moz Pro | | iprosoftware0 -
The "Social Media Monitoring" tool in research tools
I used this tool once and noticed it provided nice links to where listed keywords were posted in articles, forums, blogs, etc..., since that time @3 weeks ago... it lists an "error" to links and/or doesn't provide them in a linkable list below to access. Is this tool being worked on or will it be available in the future? Thank you.
Moz Pro | | tylersmcc0