Google on Robots.txt: Noindex vs. Disallow

Google has recently provided further clarification on best practices for using robots.txt and noindex tags, giving webmasters and SEO professionals clearer guidance on how to manage their site’s visibility in search results. These best practices are essential to ensure search engines are able to efficiently crawl and index content, while also preventing unnecessary pages from affecting your website’s SEO performance.

One important point to note is that you should avoid combining robots.txt disallow directives with noindex tags on the same page. These two directives serve different purposes and, when used together, can create conflicting instructions for search engine crawlers. Robots.txt disallow tells search engines not to crawl a page, while the noindex tag tells them not to index it. This inconsistency can result in search engines ignoring one or both directives, leading to confusion about which pages should or should not appear in search results.

If you want a page to be crawled by search engines but not included in search results, the correct approach is to use a noindex tag. This ensures that while Googlebot can still access and crawl the page for internal linking purposes or other reasons, it will not appear in search results, helping to prevent low-value or duplicate content from impacting your rankings.

On the other hand, if there is a page that you do not want Google to crawl at all — such as duplicate content, admin pages, or private sections of your site — then you should use robots.txt disallow. This directive prevents Googlebot from crawling and accessing the page, ensuring that it does not waste crawl budget or cause issues with your site’s SEO.

By following these guidelines, you can optimise your website’s crawl budget, ensure search engines efficiently index your most important pages, and avoid unnecessary complications in your SEO strategy. Understanding when to use robots.txt and noindex tags properly will help your website perform better in search results while protecting valuable content from being mismanaged.

In a recent YouTube video, Google’s Martin Splitt offered valuable insights into the differences between two important SEO tools: the “noindex” tag in robots meta tags and the “disallow” command in robots.txt files.

Splitt, who serves as a Developer Advocate at Google, explained that both methods are used to manage how search engine crawlers interact with a website, but each serves a distinct function. The noindex tag is used when you want a page to be crawled but not included in search engine results. This is useful when you have content that is important for search engines to examine but not to show in search rankings.

On the other hand, the disallow command in robots.txt is used to prevent search engine crawlers from even accessing certain pages or sections of a website. This method is ideal for pages that you never want to be crawled at all, such as duplicate content, admin areas, or any other content you don’t wish to be publicly indexed.

Splitt emphasised the importance of understanding when and how to use these tools, as using them incorrectly can lead to SEO issues, such as accidentally blocking search engines from accessing important content. Both tools have their place in a well-rounded SEO strategy, but it’s crucial not to confuse the functions of each. Properly managing crawling and indexing is key to ensuring that search engines interact with your website in a way that aligns with your goals.

When To Use Noindex

The “noindex” directive is used to instruct search engines not to include a specific page in their search results. This can be done by adding the directive in the HTML head section through the robots meta tag or by using the X-Robots HTTP header.

You should use the “noindex” directive when you want a page to remain out of search results but still be accessible for search engines to crawl and read its content. This is particularly useful for pages that users can view but you don’t want to appear in search engine listings. Examples include thank-you pages, confirmation pages, or internal search result pages, which are often relevant to users but don’t need to be indexed by search engines.

When To Use Disallow

The “disallow” directive in a website’s robots.txt file is an important tool for controlling how search engine crawlers interact with a website. By using this directive, webmasters can prevent search engine bots from accessing specific URLs or patterns across the site. When a page is marked as “disallowed,” search engines are unable to crawl or index the content, meaning it will not appear in search results.

Martin Splitt, a Developer Advocate at Google, emphasises that the “disallow” directive should be used when you need to block search engines from retrieving or processing a page completely. This approach is particularly useful for pages that contain sensitive information, such as private user data or internal resources that are not meant for public view. Additionally, “disallow” can be used for pages that aren’t relevant to search engines, such as duplicate content or admin pages, ensuring that search engine crawlers don’t waste resources indexing irrelevant or redundant information. By carefully using this directive, website owners can maintain better control over which pages are accessible to search engines and which ones are kept private.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

A common mistake that many website owners make is using both the “noindex” and “disallow” directives on the same page. According to Martin Splitt, this approach can cause problems and should be avoided.

When a page is disallowed in the robots.txt file, search engine crawlers are unable to access the page, meaning they cannot see the “noindex” tag placed in the page’s meta tag or X-Robots header. This can lead to confusion, as the page might still get indexed by search engines, but with very limited or incomplete information, which is not ideal.

To effectively prevent a page from appearing in search results, Splitt suggests using the “noindex” directive alone, without the “disallow” directive in the robots.txt file. This ensures that search engines can still access the page and read the “noindex” instruction, keeping the page out of search results while allowing crawlers to process the content.

Google provides a useful robots.txt report within Google Search Console, which allows website owners to test and monitor the impact of their robots.txt files on search engine indexing. This tool can help users ensure their instructions are being correctly followed and avoid any indexing issues.

Why This Matters

Understanding the correct application of the “noindex” and “disallow” directives is crucial for SEO professionals looking to optimise their websites effectively. These two commands serve different purposes, and using them correctly can help maintain a clear structure for how content is indexed and crawled by search engines.

By following Google’s guidance and utilising the testing tools available, such as Google Search Console’s robots.txt report, SEO experts can ensure that their content is indexed according to their preferences. This approach will help guarantee that pages appear in search results as intended, improving overall visibility and search engine performance.