What’s the best way to handle multiple website languages in terms of metatags that should be used and pages sent on our sitemap?

[allanformigoni]

Hey everyone,

Has anyone here worked with SEO + website translations?

• When should we use canonical or alternate tag if we want the user to find our page on the language he used on Google?
• Should we send all pages on all the different locales on the sitemap?

Looking forward to hearing from you!

Thanks!

[ThomasHarvey]

This is my go to resource. Really helps plot it all out visually.

https://hreflang.org/use-hreflang-canonical-together/

As for sitemaps, refer to this: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/2620865?hl=en

If after those articles you aren't 100% sure, i'll try and answer any specific questions point by point.

[allanformigoni]

Thanks, Thomas!

I'll definitely have a look here and let you know if we got any other questions.

[gfiorelli1]

Allan, the Google resource is the base.

However, remember always that:

1. Google suggests using always the rel="canonical", even if it's only self-referential.

2. The href in the hreflang must always indicate a canonical URL. If not, Google will consider it a mistake and won't consider the hreflang.

3. If you're targeting two different languages (i.e.: English and Spanish), the use of the hreflang is not strictly necessary, however using it is another signal you give to Google about how you want your urls target a specific audience based on language or language/country.