Technical Seo
Noindex Tag
A meta tag or HTTP header directive that tells search engines not to include a specific page in their index. Unlike robots.txt, which prevents crawling, noindex allows crawling but prevents the page from appearing in search results.
Why Noindex Tag Matters for SEO
Noindex is your precision tool for keeping low-value pages out of the index without blocking crawling. It's how you handle thank-you pages, internal search results, tag archives, and other pages that shouldn't rank but may need to be crawled for link discovery.
How Noindex Tag Works
You add to the page's head, or send an X-Robots-Tag: noindex HTTP header. Search engines must be able to crawl the page to see the directive. If you block crawling in robots.txt AND add noindex, the bot can't see the noindex tag, and the page might stay indexed.
Common Mistakes
- Blocking a page in robots.txt and adding noindex, making the noindex invisible
- Accidentally leaving noindex tags on production pages after migrating from staging
- Using noindex when a 301 redirect or canonical tag would be more appropriate
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