About the Canonical link checker
A quick solution to help you identify the canonical tag of your web page. Simply insert the URL to your webpage and our tool will inform you regarding the state of your canonical tag.
What are canonical links?
Canonical URLS, or links play a pivotal role in the world of SEO. They are not mandatory but they help differentiate similar pages. They inform the search engines about the preferred version of a wepage when multiple versions with similar content exists. These tag helps search engines consolidate the ranking signals and avoid splitting the page's authority among duplicates.
A canonical is simply a HTML link tag that is located inside the <head> section of a web page. The name "canonical" comes from the "rel" attribute. When we open the source of a page we can navigate to the head section and find it like this:
<link rel="canonical" href="https://mydomain/the-link-i-want-displayed">
How can I check for canonical tag?
The hardest way is to check your page HTML content using the Developer Tools or the Page Source feature. The easy way is to use a Canonical Tag Checker like the one we offer. Free to use and most important simple!
To check canonical url using the Developer tools you must:
- Open up the developer tools, right click anywhere on the page
- Select "Inspect Element" or "View Page Source"; the latter will open a new page containing pure HTML code of the page
- Navigate to the <head> Section of the page
- Between the head tags you will find a tag that looks like this:
<link rel="canonical" href="https://mydomain/the-link-i-want-displayed">
How can canoniclas help sites?
Canonical tags allow website owners to specify the preferred version of a page, essentially telling search engines which URL should be considered the original or authoritative source. This helps in avoiding potential penalties for duplicate content and ensures that the chosen canonical URL is the one that gets indexed and ranked.
How canonical URLs affect SEO?
One of the primary functions of canonical tags is to address the problem of duplicate content. Duplicate content arises when similar or identical content appears on multiple webpages or URLs within a website. Search engines like Google aim to provide users with diverse and relevant search results, and duplicate content can confuse their algorithms.
Canonical tags are instrumental in concentrating ranking signals. When a website has multiple versions of the same content, ranking signals like backlinks, user engagement metrics, and social shares can be dispersed across these duplicate pages. By specifying the canonical URL, these valuable SEO signals are consolidated onto a single page, enhancing its authority and improving its chances of ranking higher in search results.
When do I need to add the canonical tag?
There are a few situations when a canonical link is mandatory for a webpage:
Duplicate Content
Duplicate content can arise from various sources, such as URL variations, printer-friendly pages, or mobile versions of a website.www vs. non-www URLs
If your website is accessible through both "www" and "non-www" versions (e.g., http://example.com and http://www.example.com), implementing a canonical tag can help specify the preferred version and consolidate ranking signals.Pagination
For pages that are paginated e.g., category pages with multiple pages of products,Similar Product Listings
E-commerce websites with similar product listings across different categories or sections can use canonical tags to point to the main product pageMobile and Desktop Versions
If a website offers both mobile and desktop versions of its contentLocalization and Internationalization
Websites with content targeting different regions or languages can use canonical tags to indicate the canonical version for each locale.
