The Moz Q&A Forum

    • Forum
    • Questions
    • My Q&A
    • Users
    • Ask the Community

    Welcome to the Q&A Forum

    Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

    1. SEO and Digital Marketing Q&A Forum
    2. Categories
    3. Technical SEO Issues
    4. Wordpress noindex

    Wordpress noindex

    Technical SEO Issues
    15 6 2.6k
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as question
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with topic management privileges can see it.
    • PeterM22
      PeterM22 @NakulGoyal last edited by

      hi najul.. Thanks, I already use allinone seo, and have that option selected, but it hasn't put noindex on these pages.

      blacey PeterM22 3 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • NakulGoyal
        NakulGoyal last edited by

        It should.If that does not work for some reason, try Yoast. One of these 2 plugins should be able to deindex these pages for you. I presume you are using the latest version of Wordpress as well as the Plugin.

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • surgeonsadvisor
          surgeonsadvisor last edited by

          There is a plugin way – and a coding way…

          I will explain both

          Plugin version is good for individual posts / coding way is a mass archive way…

          PLUGIN VERSION

          Using a plugin called WordPress SEO by Yoast.. you can go into the previous posts and do the following.

          Open the POST dashboard in your WordPress blog.

          Find the post/s you are interested in working with.

          Click ‘Edit’ post

          Then scroll down to the WordPress SEO by Yoast section on the bottom anc click ADVANCED

          From there.. you can select noindex / nofollow for that post – as well as a few advanced meta tags.

          You can do this for any or all of your posts…  😃

          CODING VERSION

          Step 1
          In your theme folder locate the following files:

          /wp-content/themes/yourtheme/

          Archive.php

          Header.php

          Open them both up.

          Step 2
          First thing to do is SAVE the header file as:

          header-archive.php

          with that new version open add the following code into the header section:

          Then save it.

          Upload that file to your wp theme folder online.

          Step 3 now go to the open archive.php file and find and replace the following:

          FIND:

          REPLACE WITH:

          Save and upload that file to your theme folder as well.

          Now you have just MASS added a NOINDEX / NOFOLLOW to all of your archive pages – but NOT the individual post pages themselves.

          Hope this helps!

          blacey 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 2
          • blacey
            blacey @PeterM22 last edited by

            That will only put noindex on the date archives.

            I noticed the same problem and wrote an article on how to avoid duplication in WordPress. For a fresh WordPress installation with 10 published posts, Google ends up indexing close to 30 URLs, all pointing back to just 10 unique articles, because of the date, author and category archive pages.

            In header.php of your theme add the following code:

             1){
              echo '';
            } ?>
            
            ';
            } ?>
            
            ';
            } ?>
            

            If you want, this could be condensed to:

            $paged > 1 || is_author() || is_trackback()){
              echo '';
            } ?>
            

            You can read more at my blog: http://www.laceytechsolutions.co.uk/blog/wordpress-development/avoiding-duplicate-content-in-wordpress

            JonathanRolande 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
            • blacey
              blacey @surgeonsadvisor last edited by

              This seems overly complex for a coding solution. All you need is 3 lines of code (max) in header.php of your theme (See my reply above)

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • blacey
                blacey @surgeonsadvisor last edited by

                Also, if you use the plugin to set the posts to no-follow and you want to change SEO plugin changes are those settings won't be transferred, if you code the solution into the theme its plugin independent and (in my eyes) the best way to go about avoiding duplication in WordPress.

                surgeonsadvisor blacey 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • surgeonsadvisor
                  surgeonsadvisor @blacey last edited by

                  I agree Ben, that coding into the theme itself is the best way to do this - however since there are a  few ways to do this task - we wanted to offer various solutions.

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • PeterM22
                    PeterM22 @PeterM22 last edited by

                    Thanks so much Ben, This has done exactly what I wanted 😄

                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • blacey
                      blacey @blacey last edited by

                      I fully understand that. People at my work fully advocate the use of plugins, I personally believe that somethings should be hard-coded into the theme (This being one of those things).

                      Chances are once you find an SEO plugin you tend to stick with it until you notice issues or find one that does things better.

                      I'm surprised that WordPress doesn't do more to help prevent duplicate content.

                      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • blacey
                        blacey @PeterM22 last edited by

                        Brilliant. Glad I could help.

                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • JonathanRolande
                          JonathanRolande @blacey last edited by

                          Thanks, this helped me 🙂

                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • 1 / 1
                          • First post
                            Last post
                          • Noindex Success?
                            GrowthHackingGooglesIndex
                            GrowthHackingGooglesIndex
                            0
                            2
                            71

                          • Wordpress: Should your blog posts be noindex?
                            Christy-Correll
                            Christy-Correll
                            0
                            6
                            1.7k

                          • Wordpress Pods and Wordpress SEO by Yoast
                            Ron_McCabe
                            Ron_McCabe
                            1
                            7
                            1.1k

                          • Wordpress and Redirects?
                            StephenForde
                            StephenForde
                            0
                            12
                            163

                          • SEO for Wordpress
                            Intergen
                            Intergen
                            0
                            20
                            900

                          • Wordpress question
                            DavidKonigsberg
                            DavidKonigsberg
                            0
                            2
                            255

                          • No follow and do follow on wordpress
                            casper434
                            casper434
                            0
                            3
                            434

                          • Wordpress speedup
                            sandlappercreative
                            sandlappercreative
                            0
                            6
                            602

                          Get started with Moz Pro!

                          Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

                          Start my free trial
                          Products
                          • Moz Pro
                          • Moz Local
                          • Moz API
                          • Moz Data
                          • STAT
                          • Product Updates
                          Moz Solutions
                          • SMB Solutions
                          • Agency Solutions
                          • Enterprise Solutions
                          • Digital Marketers
                          Free SEO Tools
                          • Domain Authority Checker
                          • Link Explorer
                          • Keyword Explorer
                          • Competitive Research
                          • Brand Authority Checker
                          • Local Citation Checker
                          • MozBar Extension
                          • MozCast
                          Resources
                          • Blog
                          • SEO Learning Center
                          • Help Hub
                          • Beginner's Guide to SEO
                          • How-to Guides
                          • Moz Academy
                          • API Docs
                          About Moz
                          • About
                          • Team
                          • Careers
                          • Contact
                          Why Moz
                          • Case Studies
                          • Testimonials
                          Get Involved
                          • Become an Affiliate
                          • MozCon
                          • Webinars
                          • Practical Marketer Series
                          • MozPod
                          Connect with us

                          Contact the Help team

                          Join our newsletter
                          Moz logo
                          © 2021 - 2026 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
                          • Accessibility
                          • Terms of Use
                          • Privacy