SEO Glossary: Hreflang

What is a Hreflang tag?

The Hreflang tag is an HTML attribute. It is mainly used when a website has content in several languages. If there are several versions of a page in different languages, the hreflang tag shows them to search engines. Accordingly, Google and other search engines are able to display the correct version to their users.

 

Example:

 

• A German search engine user enters the name of company XY into Google. He immediately receives the result with the domain www.domain.de.

 

• If a French user also searches for the company, they will receive the same version in their national language. The target URL is then: www.domain.de/fr.

 

In this example, the Hreflang tag has ensured that the search engine user is shown the corresponding result in their national language.

 

Why is the hreflang tag so relevant for SEO?

Offering a website in different languages means a lot of work. The individual language versions have to be created, content translated, etc. The aim of website operators is therefore to show visitors the appropriate version in their national language.

Google, among others, works with the Hreflang tag. But the Yandex search engine also takes the HTML attribute into account and enhances the information accordingly. If visitors receive the variant in their language, this results in positive user behavior. This is because they may stay on the page longer and return later. As a result, the bounce rate decreases and the length of stay increases.

For this reason, the hreflang tag is very relevant and important for SEO. And since Google is the world's largest search engine with the most users, the attribute should definitely be taken into account.

But also in terms of DUPLICATE CONTENT the hreflang tag also plays an important role! For example, if you offer a US and a British version. In this case, the search engine is signaled that these are two different versions with corresponding content. This prevents duplicate content, which also means no loss of ranking.

 

How is the Hreflang tag structured?

 

Below is a helpful example of how a hreflang tag is structured. This makes it easier to understand:

 

<link rel=“alternate“ href=“https://www.domain.de/alternativeurl“ hreflang=“de-DE“ />

• rel="alternate" shows the search engine that an alternative version of this content is still available

 

• href=https://www.domain.de/alternativeurlalso shows the URL under which the alternative content is located

 

• hreflang="de also shows the language in which the linked, alternative content is displayed on the alternative URL. The output is in ISO 639-1 format.

 

• The "-DE" is an optional country code. It is helpful, for example, when similar content is provided in the same language but for different regions. The best example is content that is suitable for Germany, Austria and Switzerland. The ISO 3166-1 Alpha 2 format is used here.

 

Tip: Are you having difficulties creating Hreflang tags? There are practical hreflang tag generators available online for this purpose.