Canonical Tag for eCom

Hello Everyone,

Google no longer recommends canonical tags for syndicated content. Source (Search Engine Land)

Google updated the document with this information. In the case of syndicated content, they will disregard canonical tags. But does it affect the e-commerce website in any way?

My e-commerce website canonicalizes legacy URL, size, and colour parameters. This is not syndicated content, but it prevents Google from indexing a large number of irrelevant URLs. Should I be concerned or make any adjustments to the settings?

Any recommendation would be useful. Thanks in advance.

I take it your legacy urls are on the same domain as the canonical? In my mind you should be fine with your current setup - content syndication is very different from ecommerce product variations.
Though of course, bear in mind this is Google and any tweaking of knobs at G HQ can easily result in fallout elsewhere - something to keep an eye on.

Steptoe said:

I take it your legacy urls are on the same domain as the canonical? In my mind you should be fine with your current setup - content syndication is very different from ecommerce product variations.
Though of course, bear in mind this is Google and any tweaking of knobs at G HQ can easily result in fallout elsewhere - something to keep an eye on.

Click to expand...

Yes, it's under the same domain. I am thinking the same, that both are two different areas. But I was curious if they disregard canonical tags; they would disregard for everything.

Thanks for your suggestion. Really appreciate it.

canonicalize those product variant URL DOES NOT stop it from indexing. If you want to noindex them, use noindex tag. Even if you block variant URL in robots.txt there's still chance for them to be indexed.

sangbuif said:

canonicalize those product variant URL DOES NOT stop it from indexing. If you want to noindex them, use noindex tag. Even if you block variant URL in robots.txt there's still chance for them to be indexed.

Click to expand...

The variants will still be crawlable by Google, but they are not indexing. I know what you meant if Google chooses over the user-defined tag. Yes, they are blocked from the Robots.txt.

Thank you so much.